[Jett]

My story starts much the same way as many other butches.

I had a strong aversion to dresses, somewhere in my mid singles digits the was a red velvet dress my mother bought for Xmas's. My strongest memory regarding that (perhaps my only) is the moment I'd have to enter the celebration/s... standing outside the doorway of my room with that dress on feeling extremely sheepish like I'd just come out in a Hefty Cinch Sack garbage bag. The only dress I've worn since that was a skirt I wore to my grandpa's funeral when I was seventeen, he always said he'd like to see me in a skirt... well better late than never.

But for the most part I would wear tee shirts and jeans... although I was apparently able to talk my mom into one pair of "little man pants", slit back pocket type semi dress pants but she eventually managed to kidnap them back. And I remember well the first time I was able to wear a suit. I was at my grandparents home and I was able to get my hands on my grandpa's suit and put it on, and despite my grandparents making "O" mouths (which emitted a similar sound) I remember feeling very "right". After that I'd dress as a hobo for Halloween just for the suit. When I was 11-12 I wanted to dapper up so I wanted to go as a pimp... didn't fly with my parents... besides my brother didn't want to be Ho' to my Pimp so it wouldn't have made much sense anyway.

I spent most of my youth riding mini bikes, my first a Honda 50cc I cherished, subsequently upgrading as I grew. I begged for cowboy gun holster sets, slingshots, creepy crawlers, Tonka Trucks for xmas... and I got them. I had crushes on little girls about the same time I realized I was going to be expected to marry a man.

As a teen I was rebellious as hell, a bad girl, spent time in a girls group home, eventually drug rehabs in attempts to get me to fly straight. But I definitely can't say my parents were strict and actually had divorced by the time I was 12 so I was just living with my mom anyway and that equated to living on my own even when I was there. At this point I had begun to de-evolve I guess you'd call it... began to try to assimilate into expected gender roles as far as hair and clothing... leather and lace... and dating males though I still had flings with females at the same time I was bringing the guys home to appease the rumblings of the deity, the Great Mom.

When late teens arrived it all started to change... I had come out at 17 and at 19 cut my hair into a neat crew cut and started dressing more masculine again, and I started to calm down a bit though I'm still known today for a wild streak. I started actively seeking out the lesbian community and found it, for the most part they were supportive though I had gotten the "butch is out" statements which stung but I ignored because I was just finally trying to align my outside with what I'd always felt inside and find some equilibrium of body and mind... shit I'd never really even seen or heard of any other butches at this point. I grew up in an upper class Midwest conservative as hell city where the big ha ha was to greet someone with "So where do you work, the Mayo Clinic or IBM". So most people conformed like Stepford wives, even the lesbians for the most part.

Which brings me to the first time I saw another butch, I was like maybe 22 and at a queer event, her name was KT. I knew immediately we were kin and sat and drank brew and talked all night. I did eventually meet a couple other butches in my mid and later 20's (aside from the one graying B-F couple who always sat alone safely away from flailing arms of the lesbians doing the Macarena). One butch I'd seen across the room a few times and finally introduced herself by coming up to me at a queer function and handing me a book "Stone Butch Blues" before saying "Hey, I'm Sandy". Again we we're kin, and through the years she was always looking out for me, not that I needed it but she always made it feel like she was... it was like what big brothers/sisters just do.

And life goes on this way, I had many relationships with women, but inside I was still on the outside looking in on a main community and culture to which I felt a foreigner. But when the world went online so did the queer scene and I quickly took advantage of a major queer chat site. They had Butch Femme rooms and I made some friends... some who I ran back into years ago on B-F forums and who are on this site today. I met my lady in those B-F chat rooms so though I say gak.com I'm so big woot to those days of chat.

Anyway in this I started to learn more about other butch masculine "identities" (further than what I had sitting around by myself in the "what/which am I's"). I was able to take what applied to myself and leave the stuff I just wasn't feeling. It gave me a feeling of community and culture I hadn't gotten from growing up in a world where I was an anomaly and the closest thing to me (wasn't even close) was a standard issue andro (gender neutral) lesbian brandishing fanny pack, cargo shorts, golf visor planning the next big potluck night (don't get me wrong I like potlucks... and lesbians *s*). But in this new queer online world I was appreciated for who I was not feeling depreciated.

My evolution at that point was already pretty complete but it allowed me to hone my language in a fashion that better able me to describe who I am... even if mainly or myself. I also had to slowly evolve within this culture, not as adaptation but rather a continuation of what I'd already been doing my entire life. Just like previous evolution there's been stumbling blocks along the way to understanding my butch identity. I found myself first trying on what seem to be the most fitting shoes, and avoiding diligently even looking at that odd pair out that eventually became mine... and after accepting comes growing comfortable enough to wear them publicly. Not everybody's going to like them, and they're definitely not the most popular ones in the store... but I never was one about fitting in.

I do still feel even in B-F I'm a bit on the outside looking as one who can't ID as either or, woman or man... and what's hard for people to accept or understand in terms of binary gender can be just as hard to accept understand in yourself and that it's easy to try to reject in a moment when internal phobias creep in and you want seek safer haven. But at the end of the day, you can only dance in shoes that fit you no matter the song or venue.

So after recent internal pot banging wake up call, I've gained internal acceptance of who I am, something I'd acknowledged before but I'd let myself smother for a bit... now I just need to learn to feel more "fabulous" in those shoes.

I am an Androgyne (overly gender-full not gender neutral, big difference) Stone Butch, I strongly embody both male and female.

For all intents and purposes the words as an ID to wear as some subcultural badge mean very little to me, I just am... they're not important except very in having a hold to grasp after years of rocking about on a boat where everyone else seems to have a reserved seat... to explain to those who know me enough to and genuinely want to know more about me and maybe just a way to say with words... hey... I am, like it or not I and won't hide it.

Well that and it doesn't hurt my feelings that coincidentally my being visible in it is like a fork in the eye to the binary system.

Metropolis