Frozen/Time

So... I yacking away at Namaah_Darling, I discovered something about myself.

A while back (probably about a month ago, I would guess), I posted something about the wheel of the year and what Winter was 'for'.
Specifically, I look at it as a time to reflect (and recouperate and review although, generally, and unfortunatley, not really a time to relax... oh, well. ;-)

Anyway.

I this chatter at Namaah I realized that I tend to look at the winter months -- or at least the snow-bound months there-of -- as being not really part of the actual year. It's like there's this whole season that's not really part of time.
It's frozen.
Frozen.

Which is, from my completely unbiased perspective, ;-) an interesting way of looking at it.
Why do I think this way? Is it because I'm a gardener? I have no idea.
But it was interesting to realize that I look at it that way. :-)

Anyway.
/Random. :-)


I'm currently reading a book called Femme: Feminists, Lesbians, and Bad Girls. It's awesome, and it has me thinking (again) about gender-identity as a very tall, feminine, bisexual woman. I will likely be posting something along these lines int he near future. :-)

Anywhoo.

At the moment, I'm really hungry and need to do some groceries, so I'm going to make myself some eggs and then get dressed.
I am still feeling sick.
Bleagh!!

:-)

- TTFN,
- Amazon. :-)

Fe Fi Fo Femme

I read a very excellent article about being bisexual and femme (“On Being a Bisexual Femme”, Leah Lilith Albrecht-Samarasinha) and it was good food for thought.

See…

I recognized myself in her statement about her own femme-ness being rooted in her (sexual) hunger, her need to be filled up, to be touched so deeply that the touch would ‘burn through the layers of numbness I have wrapped around myself’, her need for intensity.

I recognize my own desire to be desired, my own need for intensity, my own need to be touched deeply by an answering hunger.

I can recognize in myself the ‘do-me queen’ and the tease. I am someone who loves the good-attention, the admiring glances, the compliments, and the sighs, even as I frankly despise the covetous glances, the leers, the interpretation of ‘no’ as being negotiable.

I recognize the vulnerability (and, thence, the required trust) that comes with the sexual openness/receptiveness that is traditionally defined as ‘femme’.

But there is also this tendency to define ‘femme’ by, or in opposition to, ‘butch’. Whether that’s by defining ‘femme’ through context – a femme (a feminine woman) is ‘het/passing as het’ unless she is defined as lesbian by the presence of a butch (a masculine woman) – or through desire (the assumption that femme women only desire butch/masculine women), or through "not" espousing any/all of the traits that are traditionally considered 'butch' - strength, action, power, competency, assertiveness, etc. (to reference Lisa Mary Oritz's "Dresses for my Round, Brown Body", from the same compilation).

In my case this isn’t so, and can’t be so[1].
I am married to a man.
I am married to a lovely, beautiful, gentle man with long eye lashes and a slim figure.
And my sexuality is not defined by his presence in my life (nor would it be defined by the presence in my life of a lovey, beautiful, gentle woman with long eye lashes and a slim figure -- or, for that matter, by either a man or a woman with rock-hard bicepts, a motorbike and a passion for tackle football... or something).

Nor is my sexuality defined by ‘how much can I take/take-in’ or ‘how much can I get/receive’.
Yes, I have the openness, the vulnerability, the need and the hunger that is traditionally defined as ‘femme’.
But I also have a need to feel someone else’s pleasure, and the understanding that, for me, sex isn’t about getting off. I don’t need an orgasm to enjoy sex (although it is a handy bonus), but I like it when my partner gets one. As such, I can also identify with the traditionally ‘butch’ trait of wanting to be the one who gives pleasure, who does the touching, who induces the orgasm in someone else.

The women who turn me on (and, for that matter, the men who turn me on), possess the same mix of vulnerability and hunger and intensity as I do.

I am a femme who falls for other femmes.
(Or, maybe, I’m just one hell of a narcissist).

I remember having a conversation about gender rolls and romance with a friend of mine. She said that she wouldn’t have the first clue how to act with another woman, whereas when it came to men, she knew what she was doing.
And, in response, I launched into this ramble about fairy tales and how sometimes I like to be the ‘princess’, and be taken care of and adored and what-not, but that I also like to be the ‘prince’ – the one who does the caring, and the protecting and the adoring.

The thing is, despite the fact that I was using a masculine term, ‘prince’, to name and classify those behaviours, I think of those behaviours as feminine (not uniquely feminine, but feminine none the less).

Of course, look at my user-name.
I've had an Amazon running around in the jungles of my mind since I was sixteen, maybe younger. The full-hipped woman, red in tooth and claw, who just exudes rich, womanly sexuality. Whose strength is as much is the swing of her hips, her long, shapely legs, her full breasts as it is in her arms, her shoulders, that can break through walls.
She walks barefoot and fearless through dappled deep shadow, and is everything wild about me. :-)
She used to be a man-killer, but her appetite for blood of that sort has been tempered significantly over the years. She expects to be pleased sexually if she lies down with someone, takes someone into her arms, but she will also do the pleasing (will she ever), and enjoy doing so. Lustful and luscious and lovely and alive, is my Amazon. :-)

Anyway.
That’s about as far as I’ve gotten on this whole thing. So I thought I’d post it and see what kind of thoughts it generated. :-)

- TTFN,
- Amazon. :-)

[1] And is frankly, stupid. However there's a PoV espoused by certain subsections of both the Lesbian and the Feminist communities that continues to buy into the whole 'myth of the patriarchy' thing wherein anything overtly female/feminine is coded as weak/bad/manipulative/untrustworthy/dirty/less-than, etc. Which is a rant/ramble for another day. (But, oh, that day will come. ;-)

Energy Healing at its Best! :-D

Go look!
Neural Balancing!

(Yes, I'm advertising for Paul. Now go see. :-)

In other news: I just ordered the soundtrack to 'Once More with Feeling'. Because it's really cool. :-)

Moving along. :-)

Femme/Feminine

Further to this post, I present more thoughts on the concept of 'femme' as it applies to me. :-)


See, apparently the whole 'butch'/'femme' pairing/dichotomy is more common in working-class lesbian communities.
As such, it's not that surprising that many of the contributors to Femme: Feminists, Lesbians, & Bad Girls come from working-class back grounds. Many of them also come from non-white back grounds -- which, given that the social stratification of the US is even more racially based than it is here, is also not that surprising.

Anyway. What I'm getting at is that, because I come from a different socio/economic background than many/most of these writers, my experience of 'feminine' (and, given the age difference between these authors and me, also 'feminist') will, likewise, be different.

So.

I site an example. In "I'll be the Girl: generations of Fem" (Joan Nestle & Barbara Cruikshank), Barbara Cruikshank states that 'feminine', in the community where she grew up, meant being saddled with kids, a factory job, the high liklihood of spousal abuse, and a high level of (financial, if nothing else) dependency.
As such, for her, 'fem(me)' and 'feminine' are two different things. For her, 'fem(me)' is... empowering. A persona that one puts on to ensure that one never settles for second best, that one gets exactly what one wants and needs, whereas femininity meant being power-less, weak, vulnerable, breakable and *having* to settle for the worst of everything.

My background is white, middle class, and very educated. There was never any question that I would go to university. It was just the thing that you did after highschool, and the thought of not going never occurred to me.
My mother belonged to CFUW, so most of her friends were also highly educated (and many of them were career women instead of, or in addition to, being mothers).
My mom would host these evenings at her house, where diplomats and professors and CEOs and what-not would come over for tea and a lecture on something or other.
And everyone would dress up.
So, for me, feminine has never, *ever* meant 'powerless'. Feminine is intelligent women drinking tea out of delicate china cups and talking about environmentalism or politics or music, dressed in skirt-suits and coctail dresses, with silk scarves draped around their necks and exotic rings on their fingers.

So, for me, 'feminine' means being able to be glamourous and sparkling and vivacious despite the fact that you are not independently wealthy, despite the fact that you've got three kids under the age of ten, despite the fact that you've got a crushing mortgage and a hopelessly boring day-job. It means finding time, despite all that, to keep learning, to have intelligent, grown up discussions with like-minded women, to wear the good jewellery and to use the good china, and to know that you deserve this good stuff, that you deserve the best, because you've damn well earned it.


Another image of femininity is... a sound. *click-clack* *click-clack*.

Teacher shoes.

High-heeled feet marching down tiled hallways: authority in a demure skirt and blouse. (Go on, push my sexy-librarian buttons. ;-) No wonder I get crushes on my professors. :-)


Anyway. I discuss all this 'femininity' stuff because, for me, to be 'femme' is to be 'feminine'. The two aren't mutually exclusive, and the power of the femme is not in subverting femininity but in embodying it. Power-full, play-full, beauty-full. Female, feminine, feminist, famme, femme.
I am all these things. :-)