thelesbianlifestyle.com

At first I felt as if writing on this month’s topic would just be a repeat of what everyone else has said. And then I read the recent entries and realized that I have something to contribute. Not something new, but just my own…me.

I am a closet soft, baby if you will, butch. It has always been so. I am 20 years old and have always been a tomboy. I can’t throw a football to save my life, I can’t hit a baseball to win a million dollars, but I can throw one. I hate watching sports. I enjoy reading, and dancing, and music, and color, and abstraction, and movies, and lights, and brilliance, and writing. The only sports I’ve ever liked is Volleyball and Tennis. I can hit a tennis ball farther than most professional tennis players. I can serve a volleyball with more skill than most of the girls on any volleyball team. These are not butch sports, not even soft, but still, I confess, I am closet butch. A soft one.

To the outside world I present the picture perfect femme. Though I hate the title. I’d prefer to hack of all of my chocolate colored curls and rub off my ever present lip gloss just for the mere chance to slip into some boxers, jeans, a baggy, but cute, shirt, and a hat of some sort. I’d give my right arm for a tatoo, and my prize collection of books for a tongue ring, and an eyebrow ring. I would give every cd and movie, as well as every piece of clothing I own (except for my favorite sweater) for abs. But this is just not my life. And by no means am I saying that every butch looks like what I described, this is just my ultimate fantasy.

I believe in opening doors for my love/lover, in giving her my jacket, in kissing her hand, in paying for the dinner, in splitting the movie, in sharing my drink, in coffee afterwards in a gay-friendly place, in letting her dance while I grind, (though I am a good dancer), in smoking a cigarette after sex (though I never do), in throwing away my makeup, and in buying her the world. But this just doesn’t happen. It isn’t my world. Some of it’s true, the opening the door, and the kissing her hand. But I let them pay for me when they want to, though I love “going dutch.”

I have long hair, wear eyeshadow and lip gloss, have plunging neck lines in my shirts, tight pants of the darkest blue, earings when I want to, a purse, (instead of the wanted wallet), I paint my toenails (which I would even do if I were a soft butch just cuz i love it), I do Pilates every other day, and Yoga when I’m stressed, my ideal job ,as me, is a newspaper clerk, when I’d rather be bagging groceries, and I have sex only when there’s a relationship. I’m not a small girl, I don’t have abs, I have hips, I have breasts, nice ones, I have cruves, when I’d rather not, and I’m not at all hard to look at. These things make me, in our world, “femme.” Even though I’m really not.

I’m attracted to what I want to be. Soft butch’s have been my herstory. It will always remain so. Am I scared to break this mold? Yes. Would I do it? No. Why? Well, not only do I look great being a femme, but being a soft butch doesn’t allow you to date them. And I love them. I love women, but if I had my pick, it’d be a soft butch. And only as a femme can I get one. There have been half-femme’s that I have dated. And right now I’m dating a woman who think’s I’m kind of a soft butch, I’ve portrayed that image to her, but she doesn’t really know the difference because she’s never dated anyone, let alone a woman. So how would she know about our stereotypes? She’s never been properly introduced to our world.

I’d give away my whole world, to be the closeted me, the silent one, the baby butch. But it won’t happen in this lifetime.