Sugar and Spice?

 Many years ago in my formative days I firmly believed in the old gender stereotype of girls being sweetness and light and everything nice. A big part of the problem was I didn't grow up with any girls at all, so I never had a chance to form realistic ideas of what being feminine at all was all about. The feminine gender existence was so mysterious and wonderful to me. So wonderful I couldn't wait to come home and become one of the "pretty, pretty princesses" I so admired. Evidently I retained the "princess" tag for years because my second wife called me it much later.

From the Jessie Hart Collection

It wasn't until I began to live more and more exclusively as a transgender woman in a feminine world did I understand what my wife was trying to tell me. My perception now comes from my learned experiences. It turns out all the years I spent on the outside looking in on women was wasted. Of course, the more femininity I experienced the more I learned "sugar and spice" when applied to the female gender was a huge misnomer.  

I referred to the whole process as playing in the girl's sandbox. When I jumped in to play I discovered quickly first how different it was from what I was used to and secondly how serious the whole process was. It turned out the women in the sandbox had their own issues and weren't afraid to share them with you...or should I say, punish you with them. Especially if you got in their way.

One of the main issues I learned was the idea of passive aggression being the way to fight. Long gone was the male idea of attacking someone head on. Even if wasn't a physical attack, you still knew where it was coming from if you dealt with another guy. It didn't take long for me to learn to be careful of my back when it came to other women. One of my first lessons was to make sure I was guarding my back in the girl's sandbox. Especially when it came to using the rest room. I could go (no pun intended) from being one of the girls to an outcast when nature called. 

Other times I had to be very careful about were the rare occasions when a spouse or boyfriend was being nice to me. I think the wife or girl friend most likely came after me first and then saved the worst for him later. One way or another, the claws came out and the woman in question became very territorial. Whatever the case, it didn't take me long to learn girls/women were not sugar and spice and everything nice. 

The entire process turned out to be a positive one as I learned my new gender boundaries. Perhaps, most importantly I learned what my wife was trying to say when she called me the "pretty, pretty princess." Reading between the lines she meant I really had very little knowledge of what a woman's life was all about. I was consumed with how I looked. Thinking appearance would go so far in allowing me to be feminine Plus in those days, I was locked into a fake male persona I hated, so I wasn't the easiest person to live with.

It wasn't until I spent some quality time with other women in the sandbox did I discover the truth. Sugar and Spice was a myth.