Ladies and Gentlemen

Gender perplexes me.

As a girl, I ran around in the summertime without a shirt on - just like my big brother and his friends - until one day when my mother scolded me for being shirtless and told me to go inside the house and cover myself up. I protested that my brother and his friends didn't have shirts on. "It's different for them!" she said. "They're boys!" I was about six years old.

In the autumn of that same year, my brother and his friend took me and my friend into the woods to make us show them our panties. We subserviently complied by lifting our skirts. Then we were told to pull down our panties. I had no idea why this was being asked of me. But I knew that it was wrong. And I knew that I was being made to feel ashamed for being born a girl.

Boys have penises. Girls have vaginas. Women have breasts. Bosoms. Boobs. Tits.

I became non-gendered, possibly asexual to a certain extent. I alternated between dressing in men's shirts that were way too large for me, 1940's-style trousers, vests, neckties, fedoras and wearing skimpy tops with no bra, low-cut blouses or shirts that I would leave unbuttoned way past the acceptable collarbone level, and short shorts, which defied respectability and manifested a certain raw girl power.

The first time a group of men commented on my hot adolescent body, I was confused and embarrassed. This confusion and embarrassment continues to this day to a lesser degree. But it's still there.

I think I just don't see sex in the same way as other people. As a result, I typically don't experience women and men as women and men. But I will say this:

I have a strange fascination with boobs lately.

I can't help it. Whenever women with full and perky bosoms come through my line, I notice. I catch myself wanting to stare at their chests, at the line that separates Boob "A" from Boob "B," at the slope and curve of their breasts and how they fall onto their torso. Am I a lesbian? Or do I covet young healthy breasts since mine are old and partially mutilated?

I don't look at men's crotches. But some men appear to me to be penises walking around with small heads housing small brains that think small thoughts - all basically amounting to, how can I make myself feel more virile today?

That's just some men, though.

Women do things to make themselves attractive to men. They tease their hair up into piles and plaster make-up to their poor faces in an attempt to make their eyes look larger or smaller or their lips look larger or smaller or their cheeks look shinier or less shiny. They wear tall shoes that make their butts more noticeable. They wear sparkly jewelry on their ears, necks, wrists, ankles, fingers and toes. They put on smelly stuff that burns my nose.

Men do weird things to attract women. They walk in a studly manner. They wear smelly stuff that burns my nose. I can't tell that they dress to impress. But they walk with a swagger, like a braggart, as if one's penis is erect, it is one's dance partner and it is leading.

I've noticed lately that some women begin to look like men as they age but men rarely begin to look like women.

I've noticed some men who are dressed up as women.

I've noticed some women who look like men who are dressed up as women.

One man dresses in women's clothing and does so with great style and flair. He also sports a fabulous handlebar mustache. He seems genderless - the way I always attempted to be genderless. He just seems to be having more fun at it than I ever did.

There is a woman, who I think was a man, but changed to a woman. I had the hardest time telling whether she was a woman or a man. And because of this, I was attracted to her. Now that I've decided that she is a woman, I am still attracted to her and behave like an awkward schoolboy in her presence. Am I a lesbian? Or am I attracted to the male that she once was? Or am I simply in awe of a person who seems to transcend gender definitions?

According to the Bem Sex Role Inventory, I am Female sex-typed. But I border on Androgynous.

According to Sandra Bem, the creator of the Bem Sex Role Inventory, "The concept of psychological androgyny implies that it is possible for an individual to be both compassionate and assertive, both expressive and instrumental, both feminine and masculine, depending upon the situational appropriateness of these various modalities. And it further implies that an individual may even blend these complementary modalities in a single act...."

Conversely, people who are strongly sex-typed (male or female) may be less adaptive, their attributes less advantageous to their growth as individuals.

Gender perplexes me. But I suppose I do identify with women more so than men. When I see the older women who have begun to look like men, I want to soften the hard edge that has formed in the corner of their mouths. I want them to grow their hair long and let it blow wildly in the wind. I want to see a spark of joy in their eyes.

When I see the women who look like men dressed up as women, I want to ask them why they pattern their views of femininity upon a male construct - as if they must pretend that they have not become fully masculinized in order to operate in a man's world. They must denounce the imposition of masculinity in much the same way as a transvestite denounces the imposition of their gender. I want to wipe away their bad make-up and cut off all their bad hair and allow it to grow back without bleach, without perms, in exactly the way it was meant to be.

When I see women heavily laden with sparkly ornaments around their necks, arms, and ears, I want to free them from slavery. I want them to recognize the beauty that exists without all the ornamentation. I want them to feel pretty and bold and confident without jewelry.

I am more interested in the plight of women throughout history than I am in the plight of men.

I am more proud of the accomplishments of women than those of men.

I like wearing dresses more than neckties.

I like having the freedom to express my emotions.

I like being girly.

But I still like being Tom-boyish from time to time.