The Clothes Make the Woman 2            by: Paul G Jutras

 

It was a cold winter Saturday morning. Hearing mom downstairs, I kicked off the covers and rubbed my nylon encased feet together. The idea of wearing nylons to bed under my pajamas first came to me from watching Lucy on the I LOVE LUCY TV show. I slipped out of the pajamas and put the old pantyhose in the hamper with mom’s work hose. I got myself a fresh pair and slipped them on in my room with my sweat suit. I went downstairs and relaxed on the couch to watch Saturday morning toons. It was chilly and I decide to use a blanket to cover up some more in.

The morning went along like any other Saturday. Mom was totally unaware of me in her nylons until lunch time came about. After having my B.L.T, I went and put my dish in the dishwasher and returned to the couch. That was when mom happened to glance at my feet.

"What the hell do you think you’re doing wearing those!?" She screamed at me. Continued before I could utter a word. "You get upstairs and get those things off right away! If I ever catch you in them again..."

"But, mom." I said. "Their just stockings. What difference does it make if it they were originally made for girls."

With the stern look on her face I knew not to say another word and headed upstairs. Here I am now writing a letter and hoping it will help mom understand my feelings of that first encounter between us. The first time I was caught.

Dear Mom:

Sometimes I don’t think you remember how I was like growing up at all. From the very start I knew something was out of place. Even when you were potty training me I found that I preferred to go sitting down over standing up. You would complain when I did so.

It wasn’t until I was six that I truly knew I was different from my male friends. While my male friends preferred comes of cops and robbers I preferred games of dress up with your high heels, make up and stuff. Feeling like a couldn’t talk to you about my feelings, I could never bring myself to ask for the canopied bed I wanted the first time you asked me to pick out a bed and I never got the Barbie Dolls I so wanted as presents. I settled for playing with my friend’s Missy’s Barbie collection and inviting her over to my club house for tea parties. As well as pretending my Luke and Leia action figures were Ken and Barbie with my Death Star as their Barbie dream house. At least I had my Raggy Ann doll to sleep with. You got no idea of my wanting to buy the child vanity play sets of lipstick and nail polish when we went to the super market.

Even now you make me feel bad even though I have always love you. I enjoyed helping you and the cleaning staff when dad ran the motel. Felt we were a close family unit with the parties of your friends I sometimes went to. I remember an outdoor one that included kite flying and Potato sack races. I tried to make you proud with joining cub scouts with Jason even if it was the girl scouts with Missy I really wanted to be. Of course the closeness spent in the O’ Brian pool when dad would toss me over his head into the deep end. Even then I felt some problem with exposing my skin. My feminine modesty about it got worst as I got older. You never helped with your constant joke about how lucky men are to be able to take off their shirts in amusement park rides that got us all wet. You have no idea how hurt that made me, feeling it not right to remove mine.

When I would go to places like Fancy That to buy my own feminine jewelry to wear with female hats around town you yelled at me until I felt I was going deaf. I could never understand your problem with my just wanting to be myself.

As time went by, dad joined the government you and me were left alone and grew as close as buddies can be. I always felt we I was just as feminine as the tomboy you were. Always going shopping together, enjoying same music, movies, books and such we did together. You tried to make up for dad being gone so much with trips to amusement parks like Santa Village, Story Land and even Disney. Whenever I asked you for my own purse to carry my money in or a skirt when I had to dress up for something in a suit and tie you never took me seriously and ignored my requests that hurt me more. Why when I first learn that sex changes were real I couldn’t tell you of having a dream of going through with the operation. Or that in most of dreams when I’m asleep I am female.

As you might remember when you started to go to work for the town, you had to dress up all the time allowing me access to your panty hose which I could hide in my room so that I could slip in my long pants and winter boots to school. They were so much warmer than the long johns mom would buy me for winter. So much more comfortable. I found myself in Jr. High school sitting mostly with the girls where I’d borrow there issue of fashion magazines and we’d talk about hair, make-up, clothes.

When we’d visit your mothers and I’d go over to Raymond’s I’d mostly play games of house with Jennifer and Katrina. It was a joy the time I got to pretend to be the pregnant sister instead of the part of the father as I normally had to suffer as.

When I turn 14 was the first time I attempted to use your razor on my arms and legs. Really cut up my legs that late June and nearly sliced my wrists by accident. The hair in my body still bothered me and I wish my body could be as hairless as those human characters in the Hanna-Barbara cartoons. Still kept up shaving under my arms. Even now; though you won’t think of making me a salon appointment, use my electric razor to pluck my eye brows.

When I turned 18 it was the happiest time. My graduation gown was the closest thing to a dress I wore since I outgrew your clothes. Returning from your parents I tried to explain my feelings that I always felt but you didn’t understand the differences in TG lifestyles anymore than I did at the time. You bought me a series of books trying to understand me, but only drove me to the brink of suicide.

At this point I tried to be the man you wanted me to be while I started collage. That didn’t last long before I started borrowed mom pantyhose and enjoyed girls fashion magazines again. When I got internet I was able to look up and learn that there is a difference in TG lifestyles. TS isn’t Gay or have feeling toward the same sex but just feeling that one own sex isn’t correct. I also used Paula as pen name which most (though not all) my internet friends know me as.

When time came to graduate BCC I found myself feeling the same things I felt after high school. The graduation committe and you wanted me to wear a suit and tie under the graduation gown and your pressure to be something I wasn’t once again make me think of taken my own life. Was relieved when I could have it delivered by mail.

When I graduated from collage and started to work I would walk into places like Wal-mart and use my own money to buy my own pantyhose so that I could enjoy the various colors such as red, black and navy. Even wore the black under my work clothes like female workers who I sometime talk hair and make up with. Some of the girls at Wilson club meeting would confide their boyfriend troubles in me.

Hope this help you understand me. After all, I’m the one risking everything from the lost of my family to possibly the lost of my job. It would be nice if from now on you buy me shirts and pants from the women section for Christmas’ and birthdays.

Love

Paula

 

 

 

IF PEOPLE THINK SUCH A LETTER AS IT IS WOULD OR WOULDN’T HELP A MOTHER UNDERSTAND I’D APPRECIATE HEARING YOUR REPLIES ABOUT IT.

 

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