This week contributors to the anthology ‘Visible: a Femmethology’ (a two-volume look at queer femininity that will be released from Homofactus Press in March) got the devastating news that Jennifer Franet a fellow contributor had died. Jennifer died on December 25th. The news of her passing sent me, and all the other contributors reeling. Though I never knew her, I feel connected to her not only because of our shared involvement in this anthology, but also as a fellow femme.  Life is so short, so precious, and incredibly fragile.  I try to never take my partner, friends, and community for granted but it’s something that really hits home at times like this.

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April 27, 1975 ~ December 25, 2008
On the afternoon of Christmas Day, Jennifer Eve Franet was taken from this world. A graduate of UC Berkley, the mother of two children, and a friend, Jennifer saw the world without the filters that hinder so many people. She moved to Humboldt because she loved animals, plants, and all things natural, and she loved hiking on the beach, in the woods, or by a river, and growing native plants in her tiny back yard. She was also recently accepted to the graduate program at Humboldt State University. Self-described as gender-blind, she found love in the individual. The bravery that she carried within herself took her through raising a son, Zachery, 15, and a daughter, Sage, 11, mostly on her own—while still making her way through the hardships that life put in front of her.
An accomplished writer, she was recently published in the books Hitched! Wedding Stories from San Francisco; detailing her marriage to a woman, the love they shared, and the social reactions to their union and Femmethology. She was also a contributor to the Humboldt L-Word Newsletter, and had published creative non-fiction and fiction works in many places.
As a person, Jennifer was honest and dignified. A close friend to many people in the Arcata area, she spent her life living, and never allowing the struggle to get the best of her. Her small frame carried a soul that was too large for this world. The world has been made better by her being it. And through her leaving it, somehow, it will be made stronger still.

The world is a far less interesting place today after the loss of Bettie Page. The queen of pinup is someone who I think of as distinctly queerly femme. There was just something about the subversive quality of her work, and clearly I’m not alone in this because I can’t tell you the number of femmes I know who have borrowed aspects of her style/attitude/essence as they have created their own femme presentation.

Without a doubt the 85 year old Bettie who many years ago became a born again Christian was much less interesting to me than the woman she was in the 1950’s and yet I still morn her loss. Maybe it’s connected to my love of historical artifacts, but she is what made me fall in love with pinup, and she remains a femme icon. I remember when I was first introduced to Bettie, I was 18 and living with my first butch lover in Jacksonville Florida, I was not yet out as femme (confusing the hell out of him as he’d never been with * anyone * who wasn’t femme identified) and his room was covered in posters of her.  I remember being fascinated with her at the time, and then essentially forgetting her until all those years later when I came out as femme.

I was delighted when this week I received a letter in the mail from a dear femme friend written on pink-stripped Bettie Page stationary! She’s such an iconic image of femme to me, and though she may be gone from the earth, it’s clear to me that in the harts of so many femmes her memory will live on.

This morning after putting on one of my favorite shirts (it looks like a junk drawer was dumped on it) I realized I’d come up with the ideal metaphor for what ‘femme’ is to me. My femme is a junk drawer, it’s messy, and complicated, and filled with the loveliest treasures just waiting to be uncovered my femme is disorganized and constantly shifting, but paradoxically dependable.

By their nature junk drawers have everything you could ever want and more, they are the definition of flamboyant excess, and they are simply overflowing with treasure. My femme is keys with lost locks, crochet hooks, buttons, makeup, peppermints, and condoms.

I imagine that some of you are still scrambling for last minute holiday gifts for some favorite femmes in your life, and/or you are looking for a special gift for yourself— I wanted to let you know about this fantastic project! The Femme Coloring Book!  it was edited by Caitlin Sweet and includes the drawings of femmes from all over. Each drawing celebrates or explores the femme identity of the artist. For example, my page in the book deals with the paradoxes of femme identity for me- “femme is baking cupcakes while discussing queer theory. It’s loud makeup and big tattoos. It is a trashy, sexy, and smart queer perversion of femininity!

The coloring book includes the perspectives of 47 different femmes including well known femmes like Michelle Tea, and Nomy Lamm. Publishing of the coloring book was made possible two San Francisco donations, and all proceeds from the book are donated to Fancyland - a queer land in California.
Bellow is my review that I posted over at The Femme Show when I first received the coloring book  over the summer:

“Last night when the books arrived I sat down on my couch and was mesmerized by every page, each was so different and really reflected the diversity of our femme community. This was a new and exciting format to witness the creativeness of femmes, both those who consider themselves visual artists and those who don’t. So often I see ‘femme’ reduced to simplistic definitions, or analysis but the coloring book really shatters those assumptions. There are paint by number’s about consensual domination, including “4. hanky code color of your choosing!” Cilo Reese Sady to a contribution by The Machine about a femme sewing an outfit, half dressed and saying “I’ll be ready in a minute.” I saw aspects of my own femme identity in so many of these pages. Reading this book felt like going to an excellent slumber party, staying awake all night painting our nails and whispering! Even though I knew less than a handful of the other contributors, after looking at the book I feel like we are all friends, and I’m ready to pull out the crayons! “

I’ve been selling copies of it for Caitlin initially just here in NYC but after that I’ve been sending them all over the country, and to Canada! If you want to buy one, they are $5-10 sliding scale. I don’t do paypall - you need to send me concealed cash or a check and I’ll send on out to you! I only have 10 left — these are the FINAL 10 in the first printing. Caitlin may do a second run at some point but I’m not sure when that will be. If you want to buy a copy email me at Sassafras@pomofreakshow.com letting me know that you want one, I’ll create a list (and waiting list incase anyone flakes) and give you my address. These make the best gifts for any femme, and anyone who loves femmes!

Prompted in part by a post from  Ms. Hinterland where she mentioned her first pair of heels, and then even further inspired by finding the CUTEST new shoes today, that were on sale for $10 regularly $60 (‘Sugar shoe’ black mary janes with a crazy floral print, and a thick chunky 2 inch heel) I started thinking about shoes and femmeness and the first pair of shoes I remember owning that made me feel like a femme.

Most of my childhood was spent desperately attempting (and horribly failing) to be a tomboy. I was really really bad at it, but I desperately wanted to succeed.  In retrospect I know a big part of that was that I wanted the cute tomboys to notice me, and the other part was that I lived with my sexually abusive stepfather and I saw the adoption of masculinity as a way to protect myself, and that femininity was vulnerable (but that’s a whole different story).

In seventh grad my stepfather was only in the home on weekends and I began for the fist time really playing with femininity. The excessive flamboyant femininity that I began playing with was fun, intense, and eccentric. In many ways it’s similar to the style of femme I would come to claim a decade later.  One outfit that I remember in particular was something I put together for Easter- a lime green silky dress that snapped up the front, black and white checkered tights and neon orange vinyl heeled sandals! I thought I was hot stuff, and those shoes were the first heels I ever owned and coincidentally the first shoes that made me feel  * really * femme.

Now I’m the first to admit that a femme is a femme no matter what ze is wearing, and that as someone with knee problems I’m just as femme in my crazy colored super sassy sneakers (goddess I love living in a city with a sneaker culture) as I am in heels HOWEVER, there is something special about some shoes. Those orange platforms in seventh grade were a pair, my black kitten heals with hearts cut out (that appear on the front of my memoir) are another, as are my hot pink vinyl pointy-toed flats with rainbow trim, and these new floral mary janes are added to that list as well.  What shoes are really special to you as a femme?

Today, on the eve of thanksgiving I’ve been thinking a great deal about what queer community means to me,  and more specifically what it means to have a community of femmes.  This morning I was reading an online community where people were bashing “labels” by which they meant people who identified as butch and femme. Their analysis was that butch/femme is “just another way for a gender-biased society to impose gender-normative stereotypes on our community which is, at best, completely counterproductive and at worst incredibly harmful to everyone involved.”  This of course is not the first time I’ve heard someone say this about us, but it broke my heart all the same. Still after all these years I really struggle to understand how it’s so difficult for people in the community to really *get * that being femme (or butch for that matter) isn’t about buying into a gender-normative structure, nor are we somehow responsible for taking down the whole community with our fantastic gender presentations/identities.

I can’t remember if it’s something I’ve talked about before on this site or not, but when I came out as queer, I didn’t see femmes. I was coming out in a city ruled by androgynous lesbians and in my naivety I thought that femmes were a relic of a bygone era. I tried desperately to adopt masculinity in order to be seen as visibly queer, and repeatedly failed.  I wanted my queerness to be recognized and I believed that the only way that was going to happen was if I adopted masculinity. It goes without saying that I was a failed butch. Gender has always been something that I knew I wanted to play with, and so for about three years I lived as an FTM , injecting testosterone and trying desperately to deny my own femininity.

It was years after I came out as femme that I was able to develop and feel part of a femme community.  The first communities I became involved in were everything I despised about the ‘popular girls’ in high school, and I remember leaving events in tears because of how cruel other femmes had been. It took time, but I’ve reached a place where I have a large and diverse group of femmes that I adore, and The Femme’s Guide is part of that for me. Thanks to the internet I have femme friends and colleagues all over the world that I talk to, create art with, and just on a really basic level know are part of my community.  This year, in addition to my loving partner, our fuzzy family, beautiful home, books, art, and chosen family I’m incredibly thankful for all the femmes that are in my life – those who read my writing, whose blogs I read, who email or write me letters, the ones who I craft with, gossip with, or just know are part of my extended femme family.  Please know that tomorrow when we sit down to the feat of homemade unturkey I will be thinking of all of you, and how much glitter you add to the world.

It’s difficult for me to find the words to describe the delight I experienced upon discovering the arrival of Del LaGrace Volcano & Ulrika Dahl’s gorgeous new book Femmes of Power: Exploding Queer Femininities that came to me all the way from London!!! Firstly, there is no denying that this is a beautiful book, but like femmes ourselves it is more than a shiny exterior.

Femmes of Power is both femmetheory at it’s finest, and the grandest of parties filled with so many interesting people and spellbinding stories that you can’t pull yourself away…I carried the book everywhere with me after it arrived in order to devour it on the subway, or while waiting in line.

It is not an exaggeration to say that I fell in love with this book! Del’s photography captures the essence of every femme featured, and Ulrika’s words bring to life the true wonder and diversity of femme experience crossing lines of race, class, gender, sexual orientation, and nationality. Femmes of Power is a canonical text of femme, capturing the breadth of our community and positioning femme as the possibility of being gender transgressive, something outside of “woman,” and not always bound to “lesbian.” I have no doubt this book will be treasured by femmes for generations to come.

Femmes of Power has yet to be released in the states, if you are in Europe, it can be purchased online at: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Femmes-Power-Exploding-Queer-Feminities/dp/1846686644. I believe that a US release is forthcoming (Amazon.com says April 2009). Believe me it’s worth the wait! Femmes of Power is worthy of a place of honor on the bookshelf of every femme, those who love femmes, and all who stand in solidarity with us.

This is my last political post. Yes it’s sad that we lost ballot measures in Florida, Arizona, Arkansas, and likely California (though that’s the one I’m the least worried about even if the movement put absurd amounts of money into it) but I think for a few moments before people go back to their pity party that I’ve been seeing on a lot of LGBT blogs we need to look at what happened—– we have elected a president who ACTUALLY wants to change something and for what I believe is the FIRST time EVER a president elect mentioned GAY PEOPLE in his acceptance speech!!!! Kestryl (my partner) and I were stunned into silence when we heard him mention gay folks!!!

We are at a place to get federalized civil unions; I believe that THAT is a far better, and more secure victory for us as LGBT people than a few states passing marriage. This state-by-state patchwork of marriage isn’t going to bring lasting change for our community. This is not an issue that we can or should be trying to win in the voting booths. It is my hope (though I know saying so is nieve) that the movement will recognize that marriage is not an issue for us to be mobilizing around right now.  There are so many other issues that our community needs and cares about more than marriage—hate crimes, homeless queer youth, employment, HIV/AIDS, banning of blood donation to name just a few.

7 years ago LGBT people were not concerned about marriage. It is my hope that people will wake up and realize that we have been played, and our emotions have been manipulated by a movement that decided that marriage is what we should be concerned about. Many of us (myself included) are guilty of jumping on the bandwagon and buying into their messaging—it can be convincing messaging, and believe me they know it. Marriage was MADE an issue by national LGBT groups, and I think it’s time we take our movement back!

I hadn’t planned on writing a second blog today it’s a flex day that came from working all weekend and I’d planned to spend most of it working on my own projects, and I’ve done some of that (in between fielding work phone calls) but somewhere between making lunch and preparing to do some other writing the fact that tomorrow is the election hit me like a ton of bricks.  I can’t stop thinking about what it was like four years ago, and how difficult Election Day was. During that election my partner and I lived in Oregon, we worked over 60 hours a week as lead phone bank and canvas organizers on the No on 36 campaign. We gave our all to it, and for months it defined practically everything about our lives, my partner actually proposed to me early one cold and drizzling morning as we were chalking pro homo messages on a college campus.  I don’t think I will ever forget the night standing in the convention center surrounded by all the campaign staff, volunteers, and community members when we learned that we had lost.

I have adopted moms that mean the world to me, the day that they were able to get legally married was one of the happiest days in my life.  Even though the institution of marriage isn’t my favorite thing in the world, seeing the looks on their faces, being privileged to be one of their witnesses meant the world to me, and remains one of the most important days in my life.  A few months later the state of Oregon sent them a letter telling them that their partnership of over 13 years was not recognized, and that they were no longer married and my heart broke for them, and every other couple that received that letter.

I have such a complex relationship to the institution of marriage especially as a queer person who is legally married. My partner, a transgender butch is a legal man according to the government.  We had a commitment party at the beautiful rural Oregon home of my adopted Moms. For us it wasn’t a “wedding” there were no officiants, it was about us and our little family, and it was everything we could have wanted. We had pledged to be life partners long before that day, the ceremony didn’t change anything about our relationship but it was a beautiful and incredibly special day. When we attempted to register as domestic partners after leaving Oregon we were told that we couldn’t and that the only option to protect our family was marriage.  I have a biological family that would stop at nothing to rip us apart if I were to ever become sick or injured thus for us protecting our family was not a luxury, it was about survival.

Today I realized that I had a very old friend who lives in California, she’s fairly conservative (fiscally) but has always been wonderful to me. We have been friends online since I was a teenager and kicked out for being queer. We don’t talk much anymore as we’re both busy but I sent her a message this morning asking her to please vote NO on Prop 8. If any of you know people in California, Arizona, or Florida please please, please contact them while there is still time and make sure they are voting to protect our families.

I know that ‘gay marriage’ is a touchy issue for lots of queer folks who feel like its’ assimilation, I have a complicated relationship to it, it’s the subject of Traitors without (T)reason the show my partner and I have been developing this year. I think there is room to debate the merits of the institution, and LGBT movement financial priorities regarding it, but don’t allow states to write discrimination into their constitutions. At the end of the day, making it harder for gay people to marry and protect their families doesn’t do one darned thing to dismantle marriage.

I think that marriage is a complex issue, if I had my way I’d want everyone queer, gay, straight to have civil unions and have marriage be a religious institution between people and their institutions of worship, but I don’t believe that’s a dialogue we can have until marriage is accessible to everyone who wants it.  My stomach is in knots knowing that we will likely loose with Amendment 2 in Florida, and the numbers I show that it’s too close to call with Arizona’s Proposition 102, and (the more publically talked about) Proposition 8 in California. Yes, this is a political issue, but it’s going to change peoples lives, and families.  I absolutely care about the presidential election, but tomorrow night as my partner and I sit at the LGBTQ Center in Manhattan watching the reports come in surrounded by family I’m going to be watching those numbers as well and thinking about the families that will be impacted if any or goddess forbid all of them were to pass.

I have lots of great reviews coming up for all of you in the next couple of weeks, including a review of Del Lagrace Volcano and Ulrika Dahl’s new BEAUTIFUL book Femmes of Power: Exploding Queer Femininities which has not yet been released in the States and my copy came all the way from London! Now that i’ve gotten you all hot and bothered waiting for that review (I should have that posted by next week) I thought I’d give you a quick preview of one of my favorite new makeup finds.

I should preface this post by saying that I’m extremely uncoordinated. This means that despite my LOVE of wearing makeup the process of actually applying it often takes me a much longer time than other femmes I know *and* multiple attempts are often involved.  This has historically been especially true with things like liquid eyeliner. Shopping doesn’t solve most of the worlds problems, but this issue was resolved by a well placed $1.99 at the local drug store. Felt tip eyeliner has become my salvation!  With the exception of a couple favorite MAC lipsticks all the makeup I buy is cheap, and I wasn’t sure I really wanted to invest $2 on another eyeliner, but I’m so glad I did! The felt tip point gives me a lot more control and makes applying eyeliner like drawing which is something I have some coordination with. I also appreciate the lack of mess that accompanies this style of application, and have had significantly less smudging.

For those of you in search of the best drug store finds the brand I purchased was INCOLOR Fabu Liner  though I am confident there are multiple options in all price ranges available from different companies!