Mirror imagery is common in trans writing. I called my first blog Mirror Sister (and a very fine blog it is too, though I say so myself!). So, let me describe my recent shift in perspective (see last two entries in this here blog) in mirror symbolism terms.
Previously:
I look in the mirror and see a girl. This is sexually stimulating, which makes it important as it is my erotic identity. It is also fascinating and important to explore, and to conjecture about..
Yet the 'I' who is looking and thinking is still really a male self.
Now:
I look into the mirror and see a girl. I think yes, the mirror doesn't lie, this is me.
The frozen tears thaw and flow.
xxx
(The picture above is by the Italian artist Pino Daeni. If you like it you'll like his other ones. I've chosen it as my new avatar at Crossdream Life. My previous one, which I loved, was of Kate Beckinsale looking so full of femme sexuality, so soft and alluring. This now seems to locate my transness too much within the sexual. Not that as a girl I don't want to look attractive and feel sexy, of course. Also some may have recognised the great Kate and thought it a bit cheap of me to borrow a visual identity off a popular contemporary sexy actress.)
That's interesting (as ever), Debbie. So are you are saying there's no discontinuity between the person you see in the mirror and the person you feel you are in the absence of the mirror? In one of my recent blog posts I tried to describe how the mirror distorts my self-perception. You're clearly way ahead of me. Keep it up! x
ReplyDeleteHi Dabrela,
ReplyDeleteGood to see you here!
Oh no I am sure my perception is full of distortions.
In fact that's a bit of the point - appreciating that the crossdreaming male's perception of their inner femininity is inevitably full of distortion, so I am wanting to shift my identification away from a female character that has been built up by the crossdreaming.
I think it's the difference between 'I have an inner woman' and 'I am an inner woman'. I am finding choosing to identify as that woman is different from acting out a crossdreamer's roleplay. The latter is an enjoyable fantasy: 'if I was a woman, I would want to be like...'. The former is 'I am a woman, but so buried within a male persona that I know little about myself, beyond feeling my confinement, e.g. I couldn't describe my clothes, as being just an inner woman I've never worn clothes.'
I am finding this re-identification illuminating and moving. I have a keener sense of how being given a male persona has hurt and confined me.
It all could be misconstrued, of course. But why not go with these intuitions, rather than be stunted by intellectual caution?
What do you think?
Love,
Debbie xx
I’m not sure what I think, Debbie, except that I’m rather envious of you! “Trust your intuition | It’s just like going fishin’. | You cast your line and | Hope you get a bite” (Paul Simon). I know that I don’t identify with the ‘male femme’ concept of Jonathan’s blog, although I admire his eloquence in arguing it. I understand myself as being on some form of transgender ‘journey’ which has taken me away from the rooted maleness of my upbringing. Destination unknown – possibly HRT. I like Richard O’Brien’s description of himself as “70 per cent male, 30 per cent female”. In the past twelve months I’ve felt an ‘inner femininity’ (to use your phrase) bubbling up within me, but I’m struggling to understand whether I call it into being or simply unlock a geyser that was present all the time.
ReplyDeleteAs for the mirror – I was perhaps reading you too literally. You’re speaking of the lofty peaks of ‘mirror symbolism’. I’m still at the base-camp level where I cannot see a ‘girl’ in the mirror unless I transform my physical appearance out of all recognition.
D xxx
Thanks again Dabrela!
DeleteIt's rather nice having people being envious of me!
In this instance I don't think there's a lot for me to lose for me by trusting my intuition. Someone contemplating surgery should be more wary.
The way I am seeing it is: what is it that is motivating you to take on a more feminine identity? What is it that causes the crossdreaming? The answer to these for me right now is the inner femaleness. So for me it is about acknowledging/accepting/activating the femaleness sensed as already present, if largely buried by masculine upbringing. The model is a being, rather than a becoming.
D xxx