July 08, 2004 - 12:50 a.m.
gender bent.
washing down a night's worth of hard labout with a lychee martini
i am armed with a handbag and a loaf of pumpernickel bread... which fits conveniently into said handbag... and unfortunately broke the strap off of it... nonetheless, for a night's wind down i am ready.. and prepared with a breakfast, lunch and dinner... should the need arise.
I sit with "madonna" (not esther) and some of the hotter lezzies of the scene debating the phenomenon of hotness saturation (read: the men of the village are somehow 900x hotter than the average male specimen... and the adverse is true of the women). We (meaning I) rule that presentation is a key factor here. where the need to impress... with artifice and the acquired skills of style and self-imaging are concerned many a lesbian has "personality" as her main quality... and in a sea of dating options these women, more so than their straight counterparts, depend on group/community identity rather than personal flair to form, attract and attach themselves significantly. However, in this same dichotomy (read: dykotomy) the male specimen must compete more fiercely, as a prime example of the male ideal is less attainable and straying from this ideal is less forgiveable. THe leeway for the less than perfect male physique is marginal.. whereas, feminine attractiveness can vary and beauty may, in fact, be in the eye of the beholder... however, for men... beer belly is... in no uncertain terms... 99% unacceptable (at least this is what FAB magazine would have us believe). Identity and style does not exist independent of outside influence... and is not created in a vaccuum, this, if a lesbian, in comparison to her gay male counterpart, chooses to model herself on the stereotypical lesbian identity... sporting her plaid shirt and crew cut... she is, at the very least, making herself identifiable. thus, rendering herself attractive by the overt statement of her "lesbianness" and touting her sexual orientation as a tactic of attracting similarly oriented fish. Perhaps this is why many a first lesbian footstep heads in the direction of the hairdresser's chair... asking to be parted from the trappings of traditional femininity... a coming out of straightness, away from the hetero calling card of flippable tresses... ? I know that personally, one of the first steps to asserting myself and breaking the previous conceptions (other people's) of myself and starting anew, was to crop my hair... which took shape as the generic lesbian haircut... but paperdoll transposed onto my slightly feminine features people read "lipstick lesbian". Therefore a long haul ensued whereby i deliberately broke down stereotypes about how I was supposed to look based on who i envisioned myself to be, and having broken these codes i then remodelled myself after the less offensive stereotypes, in order to be allowed access to the "group identity" which i quickly inverted to break those same assumptions and proudly proclaim...
"yes, i can wear a tool belt and mascara simultaneously... It can be done. I have done it and I am a force to be reckonedd with".
I then sloshed my way home, pumpernickel in bag, and pondered what i already knew and what could be gained by this insight. Basically, being a lezzie is less difficult than people think, unless you are surrounded with stunning men.. .which throws the equation off slightly,... but in the "real" world, there is far more variety in terms of what is beautiful in the feminine sphere... and all that falls in between the spectrum of gendered (or imagined gendered) beauty... is even more alluring... because fucking with stereotypes is just that... fucking. mind fucking. and fuck, i just love that.
