The Time My Mother Caught Me              by: Debbie Cybill

 

Debbie is the oldest member of our TG support club, here in Ottawa. She always attends our biweekly meetings and I have heard her claim that the first and third Saturdays of each month are the high points of her life in the Veterans Home where she lives now.

Debbie survived the North African Campaign in 1943 without suffering more than severe burns during his tour of duty as a tank commander. Then he took part in the Anzio landing in Italy before being called back to England where he trained for the D-day Normandy landings. That was where his luck ran out and he spent the next three years in hospital.

Debbie’s hand is now unsteady and she is grateful when Sheilah does her eye makeup for her. We all like to hear her reminiscences, but Sheilah has become a particular friend. One day she asked Debbie, "Did your mother ever catch you?"

We all gathered round her and Sheilah escorted her to our small stage.

 

It was 65 years ago. . .

Yes, even at my age the urge to dress is still there. No, that’s the wrong word, I should say, the compulsion to dress is still there. It never goes away. You young people down there in the audience think that you are the only transvestites. The time will come, when you are my age, that it will be enough to look like an old hag, not a young chick any longer. But let me tell you that it is better to look like an old hag than like an old codger.

Now, where was I? Oh, yes. I was telling you about the first time my mother caught me in her clothes and makeup.

I’ve been dressing ever since. Practice makes perfect, I guess. It is at least half a century since I was last read when I did not want to be. And since I retired from work I no longer need to go to the office en drab, so I can dress most of the time now.

How much better I feel in a skirt than in pants. And in a wheel chair like this a long skirt is far more practical. Besides, I can no longer stand to pee and need to sit down. Yes, under this skirt I still have a full set of male parts. And they still work properly too, unlike my legs. I am not a TS, I have never wanted to be a woman, just to dress like one.

Oh! I’ve wandered off the topic again. That’s one of the troubles of old age. I find myself digressing all the time.

My mother first caught me in her clothes when I was thirteen, in the middle of the great depression. I never thought that I had an impoverished childhood, but by today’s standards we were poor. The only Christmas gifts I ever received were from my godmother, or home made presents from my parent, a home-made wooden scooter one year, I remember. We had no car, no telephone, no electricity, though we did have gas lamps in the kitchen and parlour. I had a good childhood.

I’ve done it once again.

Of course, by the time I was thirteen and able to fit my mother’s clothes I had been dressing for years. I had no sister, so after my cousin’s family moved away Mom’s clothes were the only ones I could get at. I attended an all boys school in Manchester, England, one that had a strong drama curriculum. No, I’ve not wandered from my topic this time, at least not too far away. Every boy in the school had to act in a play every term, three plays a year. Mostly we acted in the class play, but those boys who were any good were pushed by their teachers into trying out for the school play. And in true Shakespearean tradition all the parts were played by boys. In my very first term I had to try out for the school production of Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream. You’ve guessed it - I landed the part of Titania, the faery queen. Looking at me, you would never think that I played the faery queen, now, would you. But I did, and played it well too. During rehearsal I suspect that my acting was wooden, but at the dress rehearsal, when I finally wore Titania’s costume, I came to life. I’ve always found that the clothes greatly improve any acting.

You might think that the jocks in school would have made my life miserable after that, but no such thing. Every boy, even the jocks, at some time during the year had to play a female role. No-one escaped, and if a jock bullied smaller boys too much he could expect to find himself playing another such role.

I turned out to be rather good at playing the girls in Shakespeare’s plays and in some more modern ones too. Even after my voice broke I continued to play women and one of my best performances was as Gwendolen in Oscar Wilde’s The Importance of being Earnest.

So by the time I was thirteen my parents, and my brother too, had seen me on the stage in skirts. Since we had no car we went almost everywhere on foot. It took my father about 30 minutes to walk to his place of work. I took 15 minutes to walk to school, longer in snow or heavy rain. It was a rare treat to go into town on the tram (or streetcar). The fare of a penny for adults, half for children, was too much for us to take this trip very often.

Almost all our clothes were home made. My mother’s pride was her treadle operated sewing machine with which she sewed our clothes. Only my father’s suits were bought, and those chiefly from the Salvation Army thrift shop.

Look at me now! Here I sit in my wheel chair, wearing a silk blouse, a tweed skirt and a pashmina throw; and on the coat rack is my mink coat. You would not think, would you, that I once wore my clothes until they could no longer be repaired.

I’ve done it again. Forgive me. I’ll try to keep to my subject.

By the time I was thirteen I was an experienced actor. I could walk like a woman, sit like a woman, talk like a woman, and I knew how to apply stage grease paint. I had already acquired my name Debbie at school, an extension of my initials DB, and perhaps more appropriate for someone who always acted female roles. I had started to play dress up with my mother’s clothes when I was alone in the house. Then, one day, my mother arrived home quite unexpectedly early. I never heard her. There was no slam of a car door to herald her approach, no click of heels on the sidewalk; we had no car, and my mother wore rubber-soled flats when she was walking around. She only wore heels for evenings.

I was deep in my book, totally absorbed, wearing a cotton dress, lisle stockings, and lipstick when she walked in and saw me. Caught red-handed. Nowhere to go. Nowhere to hide.

I burst into tears. Was this part of my acting as a girl? She came over towards me and I rose to my feet, just half an inch taller than her in my stockinged feet. My mother took me in a great hug, gently stroking the side of my neck with her thumb.

"There! There! Don’t cry. There’s nothing to cry about."

I continued sobbing and my mother sat me down on the couch, and sat beside me still holding me to her bosom. When the sobbing finally died away she rose to her feet and led me by the hand into the kitchen.

"I think we both need a c up of tea."

The English answer to any crisis. We sat at the kitchen table and drank our tea, strong, with milk and sugar. I hate tea that way today, but then it was comforting. After the first cup I began to wonder what was coming next. What sort of lecture would I receive. I was calm enough by now, ready to receive anything that came at me. It was sure to be something bad. My mother had not berated me in the heat of the moment, but something held over to a calmer moment could only be worse.

"If you’re going to wear my clothes and makeup I think you should learn to do it properly."

That was all. She came over and hugged me again. That very day the lessons began. I learned that lipstick was not to be used like lipstick in stage makeup. One of the things I loved about acting was wearing lipstick. What girl does not love lipstick?

My mother wore very little makeup herself, just lipstick and powder. I suppose anything more would be too expensive in those days of the depression, but both my parents were members of the local dramatic society and she regularly did the stage makeup for them. Even though she used so little herself she knew the use of eye makeup, rouge (as it was called then), and all the other cosmetics.

The lessons began in earnest.

"A thirteen-year old girl does not wear makeup. If you are gong to wear it you must look like an eighteen-year old. Besides I have no clothes suitable for a thirteen-year old."

So my mother began the process of transforming me into an eighteen-year old girl. No miniskirts, of course. They were not invented until decades later. I see all you girls down there in minis and I don’t suppose you can even remember a day when there were no miniskirts to be worn. My skirts, or rather my mother’s skirts, finished at knee-length, and most of them were cut on the bias. Mom was proud of her ability to sew on the bias. Apparently this was the height of fashion at the time and is more difficult to perform than sewing with the run of the fabric.

For the most part she expected me to wear her dresses, especially the older ones, which were never as frequently repaired as my own clothes, but once or twice she made me a dress of my own, after we had pored over patterns together.

This was the days before nylon was discovered. Just imagine, no nylon stockings, no nylon panties, no nylon bras or slips, none of that thrill of nylon sliding over our shaved bodies. To be sure there were silk stockings, silk knickers (we never called them panties in those days), silk slips, but no silk bras, but they were expensive, quite beyond our stringent budget. I had to make do with cotton knickers, cotton bras, lisle stockings, cotton slips. No lace, no embroidery until my mother taught me how to embroider. And, of course all these garments, except bras, were made by my mother at her sewing machine.

Slowly my posture improved. I had to walk around the room with a book on my head.

"Pull your shoulders back, Debbie," Yes, she had started to call me Debbie when I was dressed and we both feared that she might forget and call me Debbie when I was en drab, with my father or brother present. She never did, though. " Throw out your chest. Her bosom is a woman’s chief asset. Don’t try to hide it by slouching, or by crossing your arms over your chest."

Almost no-one used eye-shadow in those days, except for the stage, and it was from her stage makeup kit that my mother found me a little earth-coloured eye shadow. It was greasy, of course, like all stage makeup, but a little powder soon cured that. I still wear earth colours in my eye makeup, even today, as Sheilah can tell you, rarely green, despite my green eyes, and certainly never blue.

Slowly I learned to pass as an 18-year old girl called Debbie, even though I was not yet fourteen. One day Mom took me to the Sally Anne thrift shop. I was wearing a white cotton blouse, very plain, like the one I am wearing now, except cotton, not silk like this one, a bias-cut striped skirt in my favourite earth tones, lisle stockings supported by garters (not what you girls call garters, but the elastic ones that went around the leg.), no jewellery, for we had none, and makeup that was rather heavy for those days in the middle of the great depression, with a bright scarlet lipstick that my mother had bought for me. I remember everything about that day very well. It was an adventure for me, the first time outside dressed, even though I was wearing sneakers. It was the day my mother bought me my first pair of heels of my own. I could no longer get into her only pair.

We sorted through the bins. They were sorted by size but in no other way. We went to the bin labelled "8", almost the largest women’s shoes made at that time, and fortunately I could wear them. Not like today, when I need size 12 wide.

We pulled shoe after shoe out of the bin. If we found one that either of us liked we would search for its pair. Finally, we decided on a pair of black patent pumps with 3 inch heels. Not stilettoes, for they first appeared on the fashion scene about the time of the first miniskirts, designed by Mary Quant. No, these shoes had broad Cuban heels, and a good job too. I can’t imagine how I would have managed in stilettoes. I still can’t, but then, nowadays I can’t stand up in flats for more than a few moments.

My mother paid all of sixpence for these shoes, a fortune at that time that would make quite a hole in the family budget. I wore them proudly out of the store, a glaring mismatch to my brown skirt, but who cared?

She kept my dresses and shoes in her wardrobe (we had no closets) and my underwear in her drawers. I rarely dressed after that without her presence.

Since then my dressing has changed. I remember the end of the second world war when nylon stockings first became available and I bought my first pair. I was in the First Armoured Calvary Regiment by then and the opportunities to dress were few and far between. Nevertheless, I gradually accumulated a wardrobe of nylon lingerie, keeping it well hidden in my duffel bag. When I was the age of you young people I could dress elegantly in a long evening dress, scarlet nails, scarlet lipstick and full makeup, three inch heels (still no stilettoes), but only when I was on leave. I came to love the delightful susurration of nylon slip against nylon stockings. I never did get into the habit of wearing pantihose when they came into fashion. At first they were an adaptation to make it possible to wear a miniskirt, but by then I was already too old to wear such a short skirt. I was able to look elegant and soigné in a cocktail dress or business-like and smart in a skirt-suit. My makeup could be subdued for daytime or more robust for evenings. I gradually forsook my scarlet lipstick and nail varnish for more bronzed colours, more earth-toned in line with the style of eye makeup that I had adopted so early under the tutelage of my darling mother.

With my corset I had a suave figure, like a runway model, and my small breasts (my preferred breast forms were size B) increased the figure of a model. At six feet I was too tall to be anything else but a model.

Those days are long passed for me. Yes, I can pass as a woman with no trouble at all, but it is an an old hag, not as an elegant model. I can’t wear a corset in this damned wheel chair. Have you ever tried sitting on the edge of a wheel chair? That is how you must sit when you wear a corset. Sometimes in the Home I wear it for old times sake, but if I want to go out I must leave it off.

My lovely black leather cat suit that I used to wear when playing the domme femme is a thing of the past, as is my chastity belt that I wore when I was playing the other role. A cat suit looks silly when you are sitting in a wheel chair, and now that my plumbing is giving me trouble I can’t be bothered with a chastity belt.

Now, you girls have heard enough from me. Thank you for inviting me to address this meeting of your TG club. Such clubs did not exist in my youth.

Now, nurse, if you can help me on with my mother’s mink coat, we can leave these young girls to their dancing and you can take me back to the Veterans’ Home. I bought her that coat only 2 years before she died, the first fur coat she ever had, and I still think of her and of her reaction to my wearing her clothes every time I wear it. Goodnight all.

 

 

© 2001
The above work is copyrighted material. Anyone wishing to copy, archive, or re-post this story must contact the author for permission.