I've had lots of experiences where the things I liked, were labeled male. I like the scents men get to wear as aftershave and cologne. They're often woodsy and subtle. I don't like flowery scents.
I remember a time I tried to buy a man's cologne (later I learned I liked it because it was something my Dad had worn and my nose was remembering) and my mother, well, pitched a fit.
For a long period in my life, my mother complained that most of the things I did were too manish. Now, this phase was meant to imply I was a lesbian, more than it was meant to imply I might be transgendered. Trans was never on my mother's radar - I dont think. Or if it was, Transmen and Transwomen to her were gays and lesbians 'going all the way'.
How I walked, what I liked to wear, the fact that I kept my hands in my pockets a lot. The fact that I liked functional clothes and underthings, thought lace scratched and was useless and liked living in jeans, was all 'too manish'. Not liking heels and preferring boots 'too manish'.
When I ended up living with my father for a short while, he too found these things too manish. And I ended up dressing in horrible uncomfortable clothes, with crappy shoes and wearing make-up, I not only didn't like, but likely werent the right colours for -me-, but were colours I liked (cause I figured I should like -something- about it), for a long while.
It's taken a lot to get me to a place of accepting myself, as myself. And accepting and allowing myself to have moods and personality fluctuations and not counting them as me going against myself, or me conforming to people's expectations, etc.
So on the one hand, somethings are transgressive. But we only have the ability to make them transgressive, due to privilege.
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I remember a time I tried to buy a man's cologne (later I learned I liked it because it was something my Dad had worn and my nose was remembering) and my mother, well, pitched a fit.
For a long period in my life, my mother complained that most of the things I did were too manish. Now, this phase was meant to imply I was a lesbian, more than it was meant to imply I might be transgendered. Trans was never on my mother's radar - I dont think. Or if it was, Transmen and Transwomen to her were gays and lesbians 'going all the way'.
How I walked, what I liked to wear, the fact that I kept my hands in my pockets a lot. The fact that I liked functional clothes and underthings, thought lace scratched and was useless and liked living in jeans, was all 'too manish'. Not liking heels and preferring boots 'too manish'.
When I ended up living with my father for a short while, he too found these things too manish. And I ended up dressing in horrible uncomfortable clothes, with crappy shoes and wearing make-up, I not only didn't like, but likely werent the right colours for -me-, but were colours I liked (cause I figured I should like -something- about it), for a long while.
It's taken a lot to get me to a place of accepting myself, as myself. And accepting and allowing myself to have moods and personality fluctuations and not counting them as me going against myself, or me conforming to people's expectations, etc.
So on the one hand, somethings are transgressive. But we only have the ability to make them transgressive, due to privilege.