Femme in boy's clothing.

OK, perhaps not as perilous as a wolf in sheep's clothing, but I think there are some similarities.

I identify as a femme. I'm certainly feminine - I love getting dressed up, have a total weakness for high heels, and don't believe in shorts, opting instead for short skirts if the weather allows. My hair is waist-length now (!) when I take the time to straighten it. I live for my liquid eyeliner and mascara. I have pronounced curves that I play up at every chance I get. I generally keep my nails long (and natural), except when the situation or partner requires otherwise - I'm not inconsiderate, here! I can be quite emotional, and I'm prone to stereotypically feminine bouts of insanity and over-analysis.

Even so, I'm not a girly-girl. My voice isn't exceptionally high, I sing as an alto and even, rarely, as a tenor. I love working on cars. For all my high heels and skirts, I think I only own two items of pink clothing. I opt instead for black in almost everything I own. I don't handle spending time in large groups of women particularly well, and I wouldn't last ten seconds in a sorority. I have vastly more male friends than I do female friends... Although those women in my life are certainly worth having and I'm glad they're there. While I do have long hair, I'm generally comfortable throwing it back in a ponytail, unless I'm going out somewhere nice. I LOVE baseball, and get riled up about it. I grew up working on computers and playing video games, and still like to do so when I get the chance.

And, like today, I'm sometimes head-to-toe dressed in boy's clothing. I realized that today, as I was walking to work. Literally, down to my shoes and socks, everything I'm wearing was bought in the men's department. Well, with the exception of the sports bra. Although even that isn't particularly feminine. I often wear boy's jeans - although a friend of mine contends I shouldn't because it hides my curves - and most of my shoes that aren't dressy are boy's shoes. (Admittedly, that's a result of the fact that I can wear children's sizes and they're WAY cheaper to buy.) Most of my t-shirts are boy's, and almost all of my pijamas are boy's tshirts and sweatpants or basketball shorts.

Sometimes I think all this contributes to my tendency to be one of the boys. And such experiences have been really good for training the nueroses out of me. At least the boys I've been spending time with tend to be less dramatic and prone to insanity than other people in my life have been. It's an excellent example in taking things in stride. I don't get as flustered anymore. Sometimes, I even manage to let things not get to me. It's a nice feeling.

I suppose these two things should seem at odds with one another. But I think they work well in my personality. Without getting too conceited, I like that I'm not especially girly. While I know that works for some people and I validate that, I prefer to hang out with the boys. As long as I hang on to my femininity, I think I'll be OK.

And, let's be honest, one of the most fun parts of being "one of the boys" without actually being a boy? Seeing their jaws drop when I show up in my little black dress and heels, made up and looking hot. LOVE that moment.

Cabin fever

Thanks to my annual bout of bronchitis, I've spent the past week indoors. With the exception of staggering my way to the occasional class - which I only have three days a week, one of which I missed - I've been in my apartment. Bear came by to make sure I was alive, but other than that and my roommates delicately trying to keep from waking me while I was sleeping 18 hours a day, I've had no human contact.

And it's driving me batty. Granted, at this point, I'm through a five-day long antibiotics stint (and the forced sobriety that accompanies it), but I'm still hacking pretty healthily. I suppose now, it's less of a body-wracking cough, but still not fun.

But I don't care. Because I NEED to get out of the house. I almost snapped while talking to a professor today. Thanks to my cough-syrup-induced coma I didn't return her email for a few days, although when I did, it had the missing project attached to it. I understand this is less-than-professional behavior, although she did know in advance how ill I was (and I'd gotten the appropriate extension), the class is nonetheless a bullshit class where I'm the only senior and we do things like spend two hours discussing how to properly cite in APA format. Which I've known how to do since I was 14. Not to mention, we're journalists and therefore don't use APA for anything but bullshit academic projects. Anyway. She decided to pull me aside after class and scold me on how such a long response time would never be allowed in the professional world. I gritted my teeth and took it, but then she went off about how, were she my boss, she would have been calling me and calling me... The woman has my phone number. She could have called me. I left the room fuming more than I should have been, and had to spend an extra few minutes standing outside in the blowing lake-effect snow just to cool off.

I realized, after the fact, that my internal overreaction is almost certainly a product of my being cooped up for far too long. (And might have been some pent-up emotion about the fact that we spent the entire class talking about how people whose family members have been murdered do or don't process and heal. My teeth were hurting from clenching my jaw so hard.) But also, I'm co-dependent. I've owned it. But good lord, I didn't realize how quickly I'd become accustomed to seeing my boys each weekend. I really missed not just the company, but them specifically. I saw one of my closest friends (and the psuedo-ringleader of one of my groups of boys) today in class and spent the whole time thinking about what I'd missed out on this weekend. Which makes me question just how much of my codependence I'm really OK with. I don't want to be non-functional when I'm on my own.

I suppose I'm not, really. I'm going to go ahead and blame this on the fact that I'm terrible at being sick and alone. It upsets me on a pretty fundamental level. And then there's the less complex reason of - I really have fun with these boys. It's more fun than I have doing a lot of things, but infinitely better than being drugged up and trapped inside my long, narrow room. Which increasingly resembled a prison cell the more time I spent inside it.

Anyways. I spent the evening cranky - although it was helped by my Queer Writing course and subsequent speech by David Valentine, who was well-spoken and intelligent and interesting. He's best-known for his book Imagining Transgender. I haven't read the entire book, though I have worked through a few chapters. Dense, fascinating material.

I came home to find my roommates had made dinner - including a special portion for me. (I've got an obnoxious food allergy that they very kindly accomidate.) Lovely surprise. We each take turns cooking, but there's no particular schedule. But that helped with the foul mood. And then we watched Jeopardy - a strange but enjoyable ritual where we pretend we're smarter than the people on the show. Then it was on to House, M.D. I don't normally watch, but this show featured a child who was born intersexed, and we'd just been discussing it in my Queer Writing class. Took the opportunity to educate my roommates and make clear - once again - my stance on some homo/queer/transphobic statements one of them was throwing around.

And now I'm holed up in my room again. This time chatting with Friend and our mutual friend, slowly working on plans for spring-break-slash-birthday-athon 09. I'm pretty excited.

And to top it all off? I'm listening to nothing but Blink-182 tonight. It's somehow strangely soothing. I think it might just appeal to the overly dramatic side of me that was reigning today. Nevertheless, punk-pop reminds me of high school, and how nice and simple my problems were then. Actually, no, that's a lie. My problems are simpler, easier to solve now. And less severe, for the most part. Does that seem backwards to anyone else?

please?

Amalthea turned me on to asofterworld, and I think I can safely say I'm obsessed.

This, particularly, describes exactly how I feel right now. I mean, in a round-about way. Were where I am now really HOME, then maybe. But perhaps it's just that this is what I wish I'd hear.

It's been a long weekend.

The truth about valentine's day.

Compliments of PostSecret. (Also, I enjoy the fact that the title of this image, the link to it, is "ohdeargodno")

It's funny. I read this, and realized how incredibly on point it is for my reaction to strong feelings. Some of it, probably, can be seen in my stated aversion to "mush," in my hesitance to ever allow myself to be called anyone's girlfriend.

And consequently, although perhaps less obviously, in my vehement personal reaction to strong emotions I feel. Like some scared teenager, I shy away from strong emotions. Sure, I love my friends, and I tell them as much on a regular basis. But beyond that, when things really start to get serious? I don't have the slightest idea how to handle that. I don't know how to process emotions that require me to be vulnerable. Not anymore, at least.

Of course, that doesn't mean I don't have those emotions. It just means, perhaps, that I bury them deep inside and don't ever let them see the light of day. Ha. It's one of those funny-cause-it's-true kind of things. I really can't say more about any of this in hopes of not jinxing myself or my situation. But it is times like this when my imagination is a very dangerous thing.

Then again, sometimes so are my fantasies, when I can't so much find them arousing as intriguing, as peaceful, as happy. That concerns me, because I understand my desire, plain and simple. But when it's complicated by something more, I nearly always tend to screw it up. And I'd rather not.

on NOT having sex.

EDIT: Re-reading this, it's terribly scatter-brained. Ah well. I assume you've all come to expect nothing less from me, right?

Obviously, I spend a lot of time talking, thinking, and writing about sex. It's something I enjoy doing - Foucault would most certainly peg me as one of those people convinced that discussing sex is taboo and by doing so I'm being subversive, though I don't necessarily think that. (Maybe because I've spent too much time reading Foucault...) But I haven't gotten laid recently. Which, I actually believe, given everything that's happened lately, is a good thing. Although it does make it a little difficult to maintain a sex blog. Or so it would seem through my lack of posts with any kind of substance. I'm reminded of a scene in the final season of Sex and the City, when Carrie thinks her column is being cancelled:

(To Samantha) These are troubled times, my friend... People with REAL jobs are unemployed - this is not a good time to be whipped cream!... I'm not getting laid, so I'm getting laid off!

But here's the thing. By NOT having sex as of late, I've actually had a little more time to clear my head and, ironically, think about sex. Perhaps more in the relationship sense. I suppose it's an unintentional consequence, but I think, for the time being, I'm done with one-night stands. I'm not about to say that I've suddenly become monogamous or anything like that, but I think I'm going to stick to sleeping with people I know. I've been talking/emailing with friends, and especially those at home have expressed some really serious concern that I'm going to get hurt if I open myself up right now, being vulnerable and what not.

I've received emails and messages from a few friends, and recently had a conversation with P about all this. I have a hard time trusting people, especially here. I'm hesitant to do so, because I first assume that everyone doesn't like me. I know, that doesn't speak well of my self-esteem, but that's my default. I either assume that people actively dislike me or simply don't notice me. Which, yes, is why I was so taken aback when this happened. But as I was talking to P about it, he mentioned that it sounded like my pessimism was starting to border on paranoia. And I think he has a point. I always feel like I need to prove to people that I'm not a bitch, that I'm actually smart and worth spending time with. The paranoia aspect is perhaps most prevalent in regards to my fellow program-mates here. I went out this weekend and ended up running into most of them who were on the pre-semester seminar with me. I ended up talking to one of the guys, who reminds me of an old friend who royally fucked me over, emotionally, and he asked me several times why I don't come out with he and his friends (the seminar-mates). I told him, first and foremost, that it's because they don't invite me. But I also pointed out that more importantly, I feel out of place in the group. I feel like they don't like me and that I'm the weird, quiet, "curvy" girl who everyone thinks is kind of a bitch. He insisted that he's never heard anyone speak badly about me. That people, when they found out about Kirsten through the grapevine, were amazed at how well I was handling it, felt bad for not knowing... And that even before, though, they wanted me to come out with them on the weekends and didn't know why I didn't.

I'm hesitant to believe him, because I think it all sounds like just telling me what I want to hear (or what he assumes I want to hear). But talking with P about it the next day, I was able to step away a little bit and analyze that thought process. I'm actually incapable of believing he was being honest. I have so convinced myself that people here hate me that I can't even fathom any other option. I think that's officially paranoid. And I don't think I like it much.

So I'm going to try to do something about it. I still don't think I'll be going out with giant groups of Americans, but this weekend, I experimented with letting people in, just a little bit, and I was incredibly richly rewarded. In fact, there's a chance I'm crushing on someone here in the program (woah!) a little bit... But I'm holding off on writing about it because I really, really don't want to jinx anything. But hopefully expect a post soon gushing about how all that is going and how calm I feel around him and who he reminds me of and how he's different at the same time.

And now, in an effort to bring this full-circle... I think the crushing might have a little bit to do with this renewed drive to NOT have sex. It's a strange effect, in my opinion, because usually when I start liking someone, the first thing I want to do is jump their bones. The idea that I just want to spend time with this guy, want more hugs, want more late-night conversations, is something new for me. At least in recent memory. It's not exactly that I'm saving myself for him or anything like that, but maybe I'm realizing THAT is what I need right now more than a quick lay. Which is also kind of a mindfuck. My mind is getting fucked a lot lately. But basically, to those of you who were/are/have been worried... I promise, I'm proceeding with caution. Maybe a little too much, sometimes - something even P agreed with me on. (And, of course, I trust P more than just about anyone in the world and he knows me, in all seriousness, better than I know myself.)

In closing, and in an effort to put people's concerns at ease, I smiled this weekend. A lot. I wasn't quite so up in my head. I still find it rather difficult to get images of Kirsten out of my head, and I'm absolutely still processing, but I think I might have really realized that I am allowed to be happy, even while mourning. And maybe it's sinking in that I KNOW she would want me to make the best of this experience. As a good friend back in New York (and my only outside friend who personally knew Kirsten) told me, Kirsten would kick my ass if I went home now.

"Sometimes it all still feels like a mass of dots. But more and more these days, I feel like we're all connected. And it's beautiful... and funny... and good."
(Bonus points to anyone who can name where that quote is from. WITHOUT imdb'ing it!)