Words of wisdom

The Petco clerk tells me she’s like a cockroach.

“I’ve see everything, honey. This ain’t gonna kill me.”

Who wore it better? Bieber or the lesbians?

She wears a pair of one-size-too-big jeans cinched at the waist by a thick brown leather belt. Her hair is styled like Justin Bieber’s circa 2012. Her laugh is loud like shattered glass.

“And if it does, I’ve got news for you. We’re all gonna go sometime.”

For some reason, her bravado makes me feel better.

Mr. Rogers said in times of crisis to look for the helpers.

I say look for the helpers.

Also, look for the butches.

I walk to my car with necessary supplies: cat food, litter and some words about not being afraid.

* * *

What words of wisdom are getting you through these tough times?  Please share.

 

A birthday, bread pudding and Sheila E.

Your favorite butch had a birthday on Monday. I know what you’re thinking. Didn’t you have one of those last year? And why is this blog always about you?

Anyway, I’m getting over a cold, so it was a quiet celebration. W took me out to dinner at a local pub, and we brought home a chocolate bread pudding that we shared in bed while watching The Office. I highly recommend this activity.

Shelia E. is in the house.

The day before my birthday, I had purchased tickets to see Sheila E. at City Winery in Philadelphia and then tweeted about it. On my birthday, Sheila E. responded with an enthusiastic “See you there!” followed by the prayer hands emoji and a dancing woman emoji. Which pretty much means that Sheila E. is my new girlfriend. I feel like this is a butch-femme coupling that people can really get behind. Also, this is me living the glamorous life in 2020 y’all.

But really, the best part of my birthday was being around W and other people who love me. One of the kids took me out to my favorite diner for breakfast and another gave me a Wonder Woman journal. And my family and friends called or texted to say Happy Birthday. I’d say that’s a birthday celebration fit for any butch lesbian king/queen. Like Sheila E says, “without love, it ain’t much, it ain’t much.”

* * *

W turns the big 5-0 this year, and we’re planning a vacation in the Caribbean. Looking for recommendations for an LGBTQ friendly resort.   

 

 

Gender musings

I took my cat to the vet for a wellness check this week. Her name is Magic the Cat and she is nine years old and she is beautiful and she is my best friend.

“Hello, tiny man,” the vet said to Magic, who is obviously a tiny lady cat.

She called Magic a “tiny man” two times.

This was worrisome on multiple levels because Magic is a girl and a cat and not a man at all and where did this vet study veterinary medicine?

Perhaps projecting my own feelings about being misgendered onto Magic, I was too embarrassed to correct the vet.

They who?

I got “they’d” a few weeks ago.

I was waiting in line at Petco. Another register opened up. The cashier waved over the woman standing behind me.

“They were here first,” she said, motioning to me.

It felt weird. Not bad. Just weird.

Gender Memoirs

I have a story in a new book, Nonbinary: Memoirs of Gender and Identity published by Columbia University Press.

It’s an essential read if you’re curious about gender and everything associated with that six letter word. These stories will make you laugh and cry and re-think everything you thought you knew about gender.

I found myself identifying with many of the stories. Especially this feeling of invisibility that so many of the contributors write about, as well as a constant questioning of one’s other-ness. Am I trans enough? is a question that comes up in many of these stories, as well as a section of the book.

My takeaway is that gender is overrated and you should live your life in a way that makes you happy. Whatever that looks like.

Cue the Charlie’s Angels theme song.

I mean, who doesn’t love Cheryl Ladd?

I did a book reading a month ago or so at a local LGBTQ center. It was mostly attended by a bunch of older lesbians who fully appreciated all of my Charlie’s Angels references. (After the reading, one person shared that she came out to her mother by explaining she was in love with Cheryl Ladd. We all nodded our heads. Us, too, Cheryl. Us, too.)

After the event, a woman who identified as butch approached me and asked if she could ask me a personal question. Basically, she was questioning whether she qualifies as trans and whether her life would be easier if she allowed herself to accept a trans identity. She wanted to know if I felt the same.

I have.

I’m still figuring myself out.

I’m not a “he.” And “they” feels wrong.

In fact, I don’t really like “she” or “her.” They just seem more socially acceptable in my case.

Butch is seen by some as its own gender, and that has resonated with me for the past decade or so.

I’d rather be called handsome than pretty.

Boi has a nice ring to it.

I have a Pretty Boi tee that makes me happy.

I try not to worry so much. The only thing I really know is that who we are is constantly changing and evolving. If we allow it to.

I always come back to this quote by Herman Melville from Moby Dick:

“It is not down on any map; true places never are.”

* * *

How about you?

Is there such a thing as too gay?

I ponder that question on a guest blog on the awesome Women and Words.

Read all about it here.

If you leave a comment, you’ll have a chance to win a copy of my new book.

Or just go ahead and buy a copy. You know you want to.

 

 

Macho Camacho

“You’re certainly a Macho Camacho,” one of the gentlemen in my writers’ group said to me with a big grin on his face after reading my new book.

“Or, butch, as you call it,” he added.

At first, I was puzzled. Macho Camacho? The phrase had a ring of familiarity.

“I’ll take it,” I said, picturing myself in a T-shirt with the words MACHO CAMACHO printed in big, block letters.

“You know, the boxer,” he said.

And it all came flooding back.

Macho Camacho?

I’ll take it.

* * *

What’s your butch nickname? 

 

Happy #ButchAppreciationDay

I hope you have someone in your life who:

Likes to run her hands over your slick-as-velvet head after you get your hair cut real short.

Calls you “baby.”

Tells you she gets turned on when you wear that ball cap backward. You know the one.

Likes when your necktie matches her dress.

Rubs your back when you’ve pulled a muscle.

Thinks every flannel shirt you own makes your eyes shine.

Is okay with you wearing your “dressy” T-shirt to that event you’re going to.

Tells you you’re cute and you believe it, even though you’ve never felt cute a day in your life.

Is the yin to your yang.

Asks you what you’d like her to wear when you’re going out on a date.

Still flirts with you regardless of the fact that you’ve been together for more than a decade.

Traces your scars (the ones you can see and the ones you can’t) with her fingertips when you’re lying in bed at night.

Makes you feel like a rockstar, even though you don’t play any instruments.

Tells you your tattoos are sexy.

Appreciates the hell out of you. Not despite those things that make you you but because of them.

* * *

I posted this a year ago. It still holds true.

A big silent head nod to all of my fellow butches on our special day. I’m going to have a drink and toast to you all tonight. Cheers!

The butch is back

So, it’s been a while. Remember me?

Gratuitous picture of one of my cats.

I’ve been busy with life. Kids and cats. The wife. But mostly life. Ups and downs.

I know, it’s no excuse. You felt abandoned. I hear you, and I’m sorry.

The real reason I haven’t posted in almost three months is because I’ve been thinking about this blog and whether it still suits me.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m proud of my posts and the many on-line relationships I’ve formed through The Flannel Files.

The Flannel Files was the start of so many good things for me. It was my entry into writing and, in many ways, the lesbian community.

I was looking for my voice, and I found it.

At the time, I needed to blog anonymously. I wasn’t strong enough or confident enough to write under my own name. I didn’t know who I was as a writer and was still figuring out where I fit in the LGBTQIA alphabet. I was vulnerable (never, ever repeat this) and needed to wrap myself in flannel-forged armor.

I’m not the same person.

You know you have 1. Or 3.

I have a new book launching in a few days, and I’m figuring out my intentions for that book. I’m deciding how I want to move forward with my writing. And how I want to move forward as a butch lesbian in a world in which we’re about as rare as a lesbian who doesn’t own a caribiner.

So, this isn’t farewell.

If I do end up leaving The Flannel Files, I’ll give you a proper goodbye. Maybe not a hug but a firm handshake and a silent head nod directed at all the butches out there.

And of course, I’ll hold the door open for the femmes before I close it shut.

Because I owe you all so much. These words are mine, but you’ve read them so gently and with such an open and generous heart.

Before I get too teary (butches don’t cry, their eyes sweat), I want to plug my new book, My Mother Says Drums Are for Boys: True Stories for Gender Rebels. The e-book is available now for pre-order and will be available for sale on Aug. 1. The print book will be available a few days after that.

Buy it and read a letter from me to my mullet, instructions on how to be an Amazon and a list of songs I was obsessed with that should have alerted me to the fact that I liked girls way back in the day.

“Hot for Teacher” anyone?

 

 

 

Buzz cut

So, I did this a few weeks ago. The annual warm weather purge of old hair.

The quiet, steady buzz of the razor, a no. 2, removing most of what was. Chopping down the old strands of brown as if they were trees impeding new construction.

My head now sleek and aerodynamic like a red rocketship.

I’m ready to launch myself to a new place where no one knows my name.

* * *

Post script:

For the first, two weeks I wear a baseball cap and marvel at how well a cap fits on a freshly buzzed head.

Now, it’s at that weird in-between phase I call “the Sluggo.”

Sometimes I wonder why I got my hair cut so short in the first place.

But most times, I focus on the way my hair feels like velvet on the back of my head and how it dries after a shower with a quick shake of my head.

And how the cosmic wind will feel cool and powerful on my bare head as I soar between the interstellar dust clouds and try to swallow the stars.

* * *

Have you gotten your summer ‘do yet?

 

A visit from the butch patrol

The other day, someone left a comment on this blog’s “About This Butch” page. She informed me that it was impossible for me to be a butch because I had been married to a man and had had a child with him.

Stop “appropriating” the word “butch,” she ordered me. As if she had the authority to do so. As if she owned the word “butch” and got a royalty every time someone used the term. Or was in charge of deciding who can be a butch and who can’t, perhaps based on some scale that takes into consideration how many pairs of cargo pants a person owns, if they’ve ever played softball and whether they drink Earl Gray tea.

Not too long ago, I wanted to be a gold star lesbian pretty much more than anything in the world. (Well, not as much as being Olivia Newton-John’s dance partner in the Shake Shack at the musical number at the end of Grease.)

I’m a work in progress, but I’m learning to accept my journey. That’s what makes me who I am. Or at least that’s what they say.

This might be what most makes me a butch:

I didn’t bloom like a flower.

I cracked myself open like a geode.

And took a risk that everything I had hidden deep inside would shine.

The big cover reveal

Drum roll please …

So excited to share this with everyone:

That’s right, it’s the cover for my second book!

(Oh, the irony of that call for a drum roll.)

Can’t wait for you all to read these new stories about butchness and being a gender rebel. You’ll have to wait for August, if everything goes as planned, but I promise it will be worth it.

For now, you can check out my Author’s Page at Regal Crest.

Look for more book-related news to come, but I’ve been bursting to share this super bad ass cover.

Someday, I hope to be as cool as my book covers.

Happy Monday!