The alarm sounded at 7.30am in the morning, she stretches in her manly boxers and tank and slowly stirred from her slumber. Her short hair messy from her sleep and she nonchalantly brushed it through with her slender but battered fingers. She did her daily push ups, sit ups and skipping before she walked into her bathroom and took her shower. She
sighed at her large breasts upon looking at the mirror as she brushed
up, water dripping down her chin from her now wet hair. She wrapped a thinning towel around her waist and she stepped back into her bedroom.
Her closet was filled with the usual manly shirt, pants and briefs. She
pulled a striped shirt and black pants and threw them on her bed
grumbling gently at the state of her studio apartment and thinking to
herself that she should call her part time helper to help clean up. The part time helper will not be impressed with her dirty laundry lying around and scraps of food on the floor. She
shrugs off her sympathy for the helper and quickly gotten dressed in
her clothes, couldn’t help herself and grumbled again as she saw how
badly her shirt was ironed. The
time struck 8.30am as she carefully sprayed her short but thick hair,
sprayed hugo boss pour homme cologne on her, grab her sun glasses and
watches and ran out.
Upon arriving work, she was greeted with the
usual friendliness of colleagues who knew her well, while random
strangers and couriers always threw her a second look. She became so used to these second looks that she almost came to expect them. Nonchalantly she walked through the giggling and whispering couriers and head up to her office. She dropped her heavy pocketful of keys, phone, wallet onto her table and stretches her leg as she went through her messages. A wry smile popped from her face when she saw a message from a girl she was sort of seeing. “Can’t wait to see you, I miss you.” Said flashes on the whatsapp screen. She quickly responded and continued with her work.
Now… I am not a butch, I am a femme and extremely proud to be one. I had dated several butches in my life and one could even say that they would match my specific “type”. I liked that butches are caring and manly. As
I grew older, I had shifted my types, I am no longer too fixated on how
a person looks like on the exterior but more of that they feel like on
the interior. As I had been
single for so long and only recently coming back out to explore the
scene, the ‘new age’ butches are becoming softer, I even met one who
shrieked (oh ya, I am so not kidding here!) upon seeing a toy. I have also met butches who emoted heavily, cried on the littlest thing. I
also met butches who dress like a butch, walked like a butch and burps
like a butch but told me she is actually andro femme (????). I sometimes felt like I am the manly one with the new-age dynamics. Seriously, I had only been single for close to 3 years, had things really changed that much?
Anyways, I digressed (I know, I do that all the
time), this is really a blog about butch or what I knew of these
courageous women. I chose this word courageous because I sincerely feel that about them. I have a lot of very good butch / tom friends. I
had knew them for years on end and they are my life right now (well of
course right, I have no gf, so friends gotta be my life, tragic). The
other night we went out, my butch / tom friends started to talk about
life as butches, as I listened to them lamenting, I suddenly felt bad
about the life they had to endure.
I am pretty out, I know I am bisexual and can’t
really use the ‘out’ concept but I talked about women with my friends
out in the public to the extent that I even make some of them turned
red. So… I gotta learn to refrain! Anyways,
while I am out vocally I looked very womanly (not the attractive type
mind you, just womanly in general) whereas my tom / butch friends are
clearly very obvious to the bystanders. For my friends, they were constantly being called “sir” out in shops, pubs, cafes, really everywhere. When the service person realized that they are actually girls, they will either suddenly apologized loudly and profusely causing
some form of commotion and discomfort for my friends and the people
around them or continued calling them ‘sir’ also causing some level of
discomfort for my friends and the people around them. When
butches go to public bathroom, of which they entered “ladies” there
will always be thrown a couple of glances by other women who didn’t
understand our lifestyle. Or
even when they were dealing with business, people would question why
they dressed like men, or asked if they have girlfriend in a form of
very lascivious manner.
Being lesbian is still hard in today’s day of age. Granted there are more ‘out’ people now but doesn’t reduce fanatics’ misunderstanding of our lifestyle. But we must appreciate that being butch could well be harder. Butches
are someone who embraces who they really are, they dressed in a way
that they are comfortable with and wear their hair short and they exude
this ‘handsome’ exterior. They
usually have to make the first move, which in itself is already quite
difficult, and might have to face rejections as femmes seem to be more
interested in femmes nowadays. They have to constantly be under the scrutiny of society and might be forced to dress in a way that was uncomfortable to them. When
they are dating someone, they would be expected to foot the bill (since
it is the gentlemanly thing to do), open the door, drive the car, be
the provider as a whole (p/s personally I don’t condone to that, but I
know many femmes who does).
I must say kudos to all of you out there who are braved enough to embrace the masculinity that you are comfortable with. I wish that our society will one day change and embrace you as humanity should. At least, for today, you know I have utmost respect for you.
No comments:
Post a Comment