words, words, words

i’ve been having a hard time writing about femme stuff lately.  actually, i’ve just been having a hard time writing in general.  something about Major Life Changes that make me feel so full of words and totally incapable of putting them together in a way that’s worth much to myself.
i’ve been wanting to write about balancing being femme and being “work appropriate” and it started out full of fun and clever ways of avoiding body dysphoria while shopping  for clothes (i really do have a 5-point checklist and none of it involves waiting to be wee before shopping, which was my success-proof method before).  that one is actually almost done so it may be wandering out into the internets sometime soon.
still, it’s not quite ready to venture out yet.  so while wandering through the mental checklist of things you gotta do to make it through, i got sidetracked into the ‘how to deal with disapproval from people who hate themselves and take it out on you’ brainstorm, inspired by a co-worker who keeps telling me my clothes are “obscene” because they are above my knee.  ABOVE MY KNEE.  yeah.
of course that got me going on a love letter to a femme i’ve tried to write a thousand times and can’t seem to word right.  how do you properly thank the femme who brought you out and told you it was ok to want to feel good about your body?  i know there’s words there, but so far i’m not finding the right ones.
now, this is all really connected.  how i deal with my body and my style is all about how i’m femme.  but talking about it doesn’t always come so easy, especially when i have too little contact with other femmes and an overflow of contact with people who don’t get it and don’t want to.
but all of this has got me thinking on a little project i want to do, to help myself remember myself on days that just aren’t going well.  i’m going to make a little femme box and put wee things in it that remind me of everything that is good and powerful about being femme.  on days that make me want to destroy my body and reject being femme, i can pull out my femme reminders and get my head back together.  ’cause when it comes down to it, i can’t reject being femme without rejecting myself, can’t destroy my body without hating myself first, and those aren’t things i’m willing to do again.
and that way, on days i don’t have words, i can find things that make sense anyway.  and the days i do have words, i can add them into the mix and hopefully even get it together enough to write them here, too.

Other posts by Radium

• Femme Role Models - August 23rd, 2010
• staying true in self defense (or, the ultimate femme fatale) - July 25th, 2010
• what keeps a femme, femme? - February 12th, 2009
• femme vs. bug - February 1st, 2009
• On the Street of Shamelessness - January 20th, 2009