Tonight, tonight

Well it was very nice to meet up with a couple of readers, welcome ladies, being such a fine self publicist I have obviously promoted Paula's Place at previous meetings of the Croydon Trans Group and tonight found that a couple of ladies have been reading.   This of course means that I did make it to the meeting, it was actually a very pleasant afternoon and evening.

I think I finished work at about 3:00 p.m. and not long after that my wife and daughter went out, first shopping and then to a local fund raiser they are involved in.   This meant that I had time.   Time that most precious of commodities, so often when getting ready or going out I have to rush, hide or all too often finish getting dressed and made up in the van.   This afternoon I had the house to myself and plenty of time, time to do my nails, change my mind about the colour and do them again.   Time to have a relaxed bath, using some nice smellies I bought myself a while back, time to shave everything that needed shaving and to anoint myself with suitable lotions.   Time to play with my hair finding out what I can do with some mouse and a hair dryer (quite pleased with the result actually), and finally time to dress fully before leaving.   All this and a couple of loads of washing and changing the bed!

Fully dressed and made up in daylight I slipped out the back way to my van to make my way into Croydon, fortunately there were no neighbours around, and I had an uneventful trip into Croydon.   I arrived early (plenty of time again) so had time to eat before we got under way properly.    I would like to use public transport so I could have a drink, but I don't think I am yet ready to stand at the bus stop outside my house, or perhaps more to the point come home full dressed not knowing who is going to be up and waiting.  

It was interesting to observe the reactions of some of the other customers of the pub where we met, when I arrived I was the first, sure at 5 foot ten and a size 16 I am a large lady, but not that out of the ordinary, arriving on my own at a quiet suburban pub of course I got noticed as any lone female would, added to that you don't need a degree in English to read me, yet only one or two customers seemed to take any sort of note, and to be honest they didn't care.   A little later four or five girl arrived together, I think they are all a little larger than me (boasting again) and of course they got noticed.   All the other customers appear quite happy with us there, and the boss is very happy with our custom, but there is no disguising who or what we are. one of us in a group of GGs (Genetic Girls), with civilians might just be noted as being a large girl, but when you get six or seven of us together it is pretty obvious.

I like beer, as a bloke I drink pints of the stuff, given the opportunity I would drink quarts and gallons of it, my good friend S likes beer and drinks pints, yet she advised me that it is not generally considered ladylike to drink pints.   It is OK for her to drink pints because she is obviously a girl drinking a pint, but if Paula drinks a pint then it brings into question her gender, so Paula sticks to halves.   There are things we cannot control, our height, our shoe size, the width of our shoulders, but there are also things we can control, primarily our behaviour, so lets show them that we are Ladies.

I want to embrace this and use it as an opportunity to show that as trans women we can be elegant, gracious, safe and friendly.   But that does mean that we need to be lady like, so I implore you if you are in a group like mine, BEHAVE!

Ladies, please, keep your knees together, don't show your stocking tops to strangers, think about how you are behaving, what you are saying, and how you say it.   We are on display.   Now I have to say that I think the group of ladies I met with tonight mostly had it about right.   One or two would pass quite well, some of us might be marginal, and lets be honest some struggle not to appear bloke in a dress, but I maintain if we behave in a ladylike manner then how we look is less important than how we behave.

It is now nearly ten on Sunday morning and I have just been through this post again and corrected a LOT of spelling / typing errors, I must clean my keyboard.........