OFOS Butches & Femmes

[Kätzchen]

Jet???

You were here!!!! AND, you posted about Gilda Radner!

Is she amazing or what???

I remember staying up late watching Saturday Night Live and she was my favorite actress-performer!!!! Oh my stars, she was sOoOoOOOoo funny!

She was also an inspiration to me and her husband, Gene Wilder, was such a wonderful husband to her -- even during the greatest battle she ever faced -- and he was so good to her! He is a Saint, in my books!!!! Do you feel that way about Gene Wilder too???

That video you left here is very special - You know at the end of the video where there's a quote left by Gilda???

Life is about not knowing, having to change, taking the moment and making the best of it, without knowing what's going to happen next. Delicious ambiguity.

It's the "ambiguity" piece that has become so important to me, during this past year of studies: One of my favorite professors (in our department), taught me so much this past year on that very thing - ambiguity - and being willing to accept ambiguity because it is an opportunity to explore and discover moments that are shrouded in ambiguity and to not be afraid of the unknown. And to me, this is the priceless part about being in the moment and not knowing what comes next or what change we might need to accept or even use our imagination to creatively find new ways to experience what life offers as we taste ambiguity in our lives! Truly, Gilda's humor and how she faced her fears and battles in life is a shining example and inspiration to us all! This is such a gift to remember Gilda tonight - this helps me sooo much!!!!

Thanks so much Jet for thinking to post about Gilda Radner tonight!

[Kätzchen]

I thought I'd leave a video here this morning before I head out for the day!

I don't know about any of you, but I loved the (TV series) The Dick Van Dyke Show years ago! I always thought of it as a sit-com of an OFOS young couple and their friends and family life!

*enjoy*

[Kätzchen]

In my sleeping this afternoon, I was dreamily contemplating all the qualities and characteristics about me that identify me as an Old Fashioned Old Skool Femme....

I favor songs that are soulful, sweet and charming - this seems to reflect my type of temperment. Also, I tend to prefer pet nicknames (for me) like: Darling, Sweetheart, Your Majesty (playfully, of course), and Sugar... among other creative references and my circle of friends tends to be rather small (I only have so much energy)! But, that's about as far as I got this afternoon, while I was thinking about things that are typical of me...

I kind of slept the day away tending to my own needs, so I guess I'll be up all night *silly me* !!!

[Jet]

Dance #16: Heart and Soul

If I sat next to you would you think I cared?
If I asked you to slow dance, would you?

Would you sway and twirl
heart to heart, soul to soul?

Would you run through hayfields
and laugh away the years with me?

Would you kiss me in the moonlight?
Would you teach me how?

Would you join me in a life long duet?

I wonder.

Would you love me heart and soul?

—The Dancer of Atlanta

[Toughy]

I don't identify with being 'old fashioned' at all.

I am old school. Integrity, manners, charm, do the right thing, protect only when asked, loyalty, compassion, etc.

I love it when a femme comes to me and asks for a dance. Femmes should be strong, powerful, in control, knows what she wants and will work/ask for it.

I love getting flowers. I love giving flowers.

I want to see her out in her glory.....tits showing, slit up the side of her leg skirt, shoes that make me wet (I'm a shoe whore, what can I say), looking/acting like sex walking....ok.....mmmm.......I lost my train of thought....oh yeah.....that is an OS femme in my book...one who owns her body and her sexuality and is not afraid to show the world....and fuck em if they don't like it.

I am always puzzled by the linking of 'old fashioned' with 'old school'. They are two different things in my mind. They are not linked together for me. IF they were, then I would be kicking a butch's ass who looked at my date, making butches ask me (not her) if they can dance with her...and a whole lot of other old fashioned ways of treating women.

I came out in what most folks think of as OFOS times...early 70's.....there is a whole bunch of that old school stuff that I hate and most of it is centered in the old fashioned way in which women were treated.

So for me........I am truly old school. But I truly dislike and am not old fashioned.

[Ebon]

I respect my elders
I prefer a woman's soul over looks
I like to be a gentleman to a lady that allows me to
I love old school music 50's 60's 70's
I have to connect with someone on a deep level before I make love to them
I got my ass whipped as a kid. lol
I try to be considerate, if I'm not I don't realize it
I prefer women with old souls
I don't like BS from anyone
I try to learn my lessons from the Universe so I don't have to keep going through the same shit
I see life as life, some things can be changed some cannot either way it goes I enjoy myself and try not to wallow too long
I don't let silly shit affect me
I get over things pretty quickly

I'm sure there is a more but this is a start

OB

[Jet]

Resurrecting this thread.

[Nightshade]

Originally Posted by Toughy

I want to see her out in her glory.....tits showing, slit up the side of her leg skirt, shoes that make me wet (I'm a shoe whore, what can I say), looking/acting like sex walking....ok.....mmmm.......I lost my train of thought....oh yeah.....that is an OS femme in my book...one who owns her body and her sexuality and is not afraid to show the world....and fuck em if they don't like it.

I am always puzzled by the linking of 'old fashioned' with 'old school'. They are two different things in my mind. They are not linked together for me. IF they were, then I would be kicking a butch's ass who looked at my date, making butches ask me (not her) if they can dance with her...and a whole lot of other old fashioned ways of treating women.

I came out in what most folks think of as OFOS times...early 70's.....there is a whole bunch of that old school stuff that I hate and most of it is centered in the old fashioned way in which women were treated.

So for me........I am truly old school. But I truly dislike and am not old fashioned.

Actually, if old fashioned = asexual, victorian, patriarchal oppression then I'm right there with you! But I think perhaps that was mostly a socially acceptable facade. The 'passing' front that everyone presented but most didn't live.

Not having lived through it though, it's complete speculation on my part. I can only imagine though that that embodiment of OF as 'prudishness' had to have been more prevalent in heterosexual lives than in the Butch/femme community where waiting for marriage and having sex to procreate simply wasn't a part of the equation.

And while us femmes have always gotten positive (if unwanted) feedback about our desirability, I cling strongly to the ideal that my foremothers carried within their very core the knowledge that it was up to them to show the butches of the world that they too were sexual forces to be reckoned with. That they were wanted. Needed. Craved. Utterly desired beyond all reason. It was in intricate part of the dance.

I refuse to believe that respect and/or sexual hunger was lacking for either party 'back in the day.'

[Converse]

Many relate OFOS as being about the 1950’s B-F communities, who were faced with hostility from a very conservative mainstream society, lending itself to a time of much violence – while others draw on the periods prior to that when Butch identity concerned itself with courtesy, chivalry and strength without violence. One context is about oppression, while the other is about codes of behaviour.

We can take almost anything out of context, assigning a meaning that helps to legitimise our argument, but what I think matters is intent.

Do I stay cold so that she doesn’t when I offer her my coat, open and hold the door for her, stand when she does, light her cigarette, curtail my language and expect others to do the same when they are around her, compliment, carry what’s heavy… because I think she isn’t capable, believe that she is so fragile that her sensibilities would never recover from a personal affront, because I believe I am superior? Or do I do it to acknowledge her importance, to place myself second in her presence- Is my intention to try to make her way a little more comfortable in the world or is it to oppress?

For good or for bad, in mainstream society a Butch is rarely inconspicuous, and a Femme is noticed but rarely seen. As a Butch I will honour her, and do what I can to remove the cloak of invisibility, to allow her to be seen as the woman who is deserving of respect and admiration, to be seen as a Femme.

My observations of the world are that the B-F community is becoming one of the last bastions where chivalry still remains. For me, I am happy to be considered old fashioned if the alternative is, as I see around me, a solo dance with everyone on the floor vying for the spotlight.