Showing posts with label female impersonators. Show all posts
Showing posts with label female impersonators. Show all posts

Thursday, March 3, 2022

Transgender Survivor

 It could be argued we all are transgender survivors. Even if you are not trans but are the ally of one. Crossing the gender border is not for the faint of heart. 

When I think back at all the error and trial I went through as I negotiated a gender transition, I don't know if I would have attempted it at all. 

Perhaps the biggest problem I had was understanding my true gender. Sure I can use the excuse again of  being raised in the pre internet generation. I felt so alone all the time assuming I was the only boy in the world who wanted to be a girl. By crossdressing in the very few feminine clothes I could get my hands on, I was able to survive this part of my formative years. 

Photo Credit
JJ Hart

When I became a teen ager and beyond, I discovered I wasn't the only boy who wanted to be a girl. When I was fifteen and almost old enough to drive I used to hang out with a friend of mine who could drive. On many days we used to stop in at his aunt's small variety store for a bottle of pop and a chance to look at her collection of "racy" magazines. No porn but different. Similar to lower class Playboy magazines. Every once in awhile I was rewarded with an article featuring female impersonators. It was a rare occurrence but enough to show me there was another world out there where impossibly feminine men made their living as women. Mostly in far away cities such as New York and San Francisco. On the rare occasions I found such a magazine, it was impossible for me to buy it because of my friend and his aunt knowing me so well. 

The closest I ever came was finding out a group of softball players who played in drag would be visiting our Midwest city. As badly as I wanted to go, again there was no possible way I could give anyone any indication I wanted to. This continued into high school when even though there were no womanless beauty pageants for the boys,  some occasional drag would creep in mostly for laughs. Except for the occasional participant who was just a little too good. Through it all I managed to survive and make it into college without giving anyone a glimpse of my true self. 

During my first couple years in college the severe changes I was going through being away from home as well as being exposed to new people and ideas led me away from any cross dressing desires. For awhile that is. I ended up transferring back home to a nearby university where I graduated from. While I was back home I also graduated back into exploring my feminine self. It was during this time I really wished I was born female so I wouldn't have to worry about going away to fight in Vietnam. I have written many times on how I survived this time in my life and was rewarded with an interesting three years in the Army.


Following my three years, I entered one of the most active times of my life when it came to exploring my authentic self.  As my first issues of Transvestia magazine arrived I found myself to be within driving distance of several of their regional mixers. As I was able to attend, the whole experience opened up a whole new world to me. I had survived and made it this far. 

During these mixers I found a curious group of attendees who were neither cross dressers or transsexuals. They fit somewhere in between. They were to become known as transgender and they were me. It turned out the easy work was done when I realized where I fit on the gender spectrum. The hardest part was figuring out how I was going to survive it. A topic for another post.

Wednesday, August 20, 2014

Female Impersonators Versus Drag Queens

Female impersonator, Lee Shaw.Some time ago here in Cyrsti's Condo featuring Baby Martell and Thomas Brayden commented:

For women it is often acknowledged in past times to allow them to would like to undercover dress them selves as the member of the other sexual regarding work in addition to career factors particularly for men took over career where they can pass in addition to are men. For the other area in the gold coin males have worked in female impersonator orientated occupations obtaining crossdessed since ladies.

Our vintage impersonator to the left is actually Lee Shaw.

Thanks to Thomas for the comment which may indeed be a "Google translation."

I "think" what the translation was trying to come up with was, in the past women would disguise themselves to work successfully as men.  Men on the other hand who could pass as beautiful  women could find work to as female impersonators. 

The reason I say that is a translation, a long time ago I chatted a couple times with a transgender woman in France.  Being the "tricky" person I am, I tried to use the translating tool on my end.  She politely told me me DON'T! It was coming out on her end as really screwy. 

Which brings me to the point I made in our Sunday edition, I don't think of -or mention the tons of readers we have from around the world.  I am old school and just humbled by the process!  Thanks to all of you!

Plus, any sort of translation takes me back to my Army days when I lived in Thailand and Germany for an extended time- I never did pick up any feel for the languages.  Some would argue I still struggle with English!

So again, thanks to Thomas for giving it a go...as Paula would say!

Finally, feel free to comment in your native language and there is a good chance I can get it translated on my end - if you tell me where it is coming from.  A year or so ago I was even able to come up with a translation from a Maylasian  person in Kuala Lumpor.

Sometimes it is a small world after all!

Monday, March 31, 2014

Cyrsti's Condo "Female Impersonation Classics."

Lee Shaw
Some of us "of a certain age" may remember "sneaking a peek" at these female impersonators in magazines. One thing is for sure, drag artists have never been short on great legs!

The first (right) is Lee Shaw.

The second is Vicki (below)


VICKY1 | Flickr - Photo Sharing!

Wednesday, February 19, 2014

Most Boys Loved Playboy...


Holly White  http://cyrstiscondo-cyrsti.blogspot.com/

Back in the "dark ages" of gender confusion in my life, it was the thing to do to "break into" my Dad's stash of Playboy Magazines when my friends came over.

The problem was of course, I wasn't getting the same "charge" out of them as my friends were and I wasn't attracted sexually to them either. The closest I ever came to "attraction" was what I think now was a huge school girl crush I had on one of my friends. To make matters worse the extreme possibly of doing a stint in the Army was bearing down on me as the Vietnam "non war" continued to escalate. My problem was simple,  my gender and sexual "synapses" in my noggin were switched and very few people had any idea of how to deal with it except for just stop it.  It would have been easier to have known I was gay because I would have something concrete to have dealt with.

To this day, I rarely get any sort of a sexual charge of looking at a woman (and even less from men)  but I get a real charge of wanting to be like her. "Back in the day" of course,  photo examples of transvestites and/or female impersonators were extremely rare in my part of the world and mainly in what amounted to be seedy porn stores. When they did surface however, I was floored.  I thought how was it possible a guy could look that good dressed as a woman?

Looking back, if you asked me for a truthful answer of what I wanted to be when I grew up; it wasn't a doctor, lawyer of fireman, no I wanted to be a woman. If I could have ever understood what I was feeling. Oh well, better late than never, right?

Interestingly, a couple pictures got me started down this long neglected path of self discovery:


The first is a vintage picture of classic female impersonator Holly White...and the second picture is of female mimic Robin Roberts....


Robin Roberts | Flickr - Photo Sharing!  http://cyrstiscondo-cyrsti.blogspot.com/

Intimidating Women

Library of Congress  image from  UnSplash. During my life, surprisingly so, I have encountered many intimating cis-women.  Probably the most...