Dina’s Diner 4/29/24

MA, MOM, OR MOTHER

Mother’s Day is coming up on May 12. Of all the iconic imagery around women that crossdressers use as inspiration or try to emulate, I can’t think of any crossdresser ever expressing a desire to be a mother. There are no fantasy scenarios about picking up kids clothes off the floor, making sandwiches before the school bus arrives, hosting birthday parties for a house full of screaming kids, or doing laundry while trying to keep an eye on The View on TV.

In the drag world there is (or was at one time) the ‘drag mother’ who was usually an experienced queen who would mentor the younger gurls coming up. But that is a far cry from motherhood as celebrated by Mother’s Day.

A mature domestic crossdresser.

There are, however, some crossdressers who seem to have embraced the matronly look of by-gone Moms. Some seem to do it as an homage to classic middle-aged femininity. Others have adapted their look to be age appropriate for senior crossdressers. Someone once said that the very young and the very old have the best chance of passing. It’s those middle years that are hard to negotiate.

If you’re perusing any of the photo sites for crossdressers around May 12, take a moment to appreciate the ladies who are closer in spirit to June Cleaver than Peg Bundy. And Happy Mother’s Day, fellas.

OOH LA LA, MON CHERI

Something put me in mind of the iconic, much-imitated French Maid. Maybe it was the onset of spring cleaning season but more likely some photo I saw online. I can’t think of a single more enduring crossdressing inspiration than the French Maid

I found this Wikipedia entry (edited for space): “French maid was a term applied in the Victorian and early 20th-century periods to a lady’s maid of French nationality. A lady’s maid was a senior servant who reported directly to the lady of the house and accompanied her mistress on travel. She helped her mistress with her appearance, including make-up, hairdressing, clothing, jewelry, and shoes, and sometimes served as confidante. The term French maid is now often applied to an eroticized and strongly modified style of servant’s dress that evolved from typical housemaid’s black-and-white afternoon uniforms of 19th-century France, despite a housemaid being junior to a lady’s maid. Erotic fantasies revolving around young French women later led to the appearance of French maids as desirable and stereotypical soubrette characters in burlesque dramas and bedroom farces. This stock character was a flirtatious, cheeky, and saucy figure.”

Ooh la la.

I found out that there isn’t a single French term for a French Maid. Domestique, Servante, Bonne, and the often-seen Soubrette are used. I guess if you’re in France, a maid is a maid without need for nationality. Of course, as we know, a French Maid (as we think of one today) is so much more than simply a domestic servant.

There is, of course, the uniform. Although crossdressers have promoted it to the Mount Rushmore of erotic imagery, it also lives in straight culture. The movie Clue had a wonderful French Maid character played by Colleen Camp. My favorite example was a yogurt commercial from the early 1990s where a wife spoon-fed the husband while in full uniform. You can watch a clip of it here. The French Maid is a staple of packaged Halloween costumes for the masses. But crossdressers usually take the French Maid to a higher level.

The classic uniform includes a petticoat or frilly knickers visible when bent over paired with fishnet tights or stockings. A feather duster completes the look for many would-be soubrettes. Besides the sexy iconography of the image, the maid role also ties into the submissive or sissy trope that is so popular with many crossdressers. According to a Quora.com forum online, many profess to actually do their cleaning dressed as French Maids. However, one gurl said she has a French Maid costume but “there is no way that I am going to ruin it by doing housework in it. My outfit is purely for play time.”

TIGHT AND LOW DOWN

Whatever became of tight blue jeans on women? When I was a kid in the 1970s (oh, boy here we go), skin tight blue jeans in what was called “hip hugger” style were all the rage for teen girls and young women.

In case you weren’t around for that fashion fad, it pre-dated the designer jeans that became popular in the 1980s. More about those later. The original tight jeans were less pretentious and were more like well-worn dungarees. The “hip hugger” style that came out in that era sat low on the hip bones and often were without back pockets – holding lovely young derrieres in soft denim without any visual distraction to the lovely curve. The jeans would be held up with wide belts (leather or crocheted) with substantial buckles. Short summer blouses left a naked slash of belly and navel to ogle.

It was said at the time that girls and women would soak in a tub of hot water while wearing the blue jeans so they would shrink and mold to the wearer’s dimensions. See, that’s dedication to the art. As a budding crossdresser, one might look at a woman with a sexy can in hip huggers and want to be like her. Unfortunately, guys just don’t have the same hip and rump development as our cis-sisters so it’s never quite a look that works for us. Look but don’t touch and look but don’t try either.

The aforementioned designer jeans (like so many things spawned in the 1980s) commercialized a homespun fashion movement and popularized darker, stiffer denim with designer embellishments and logos. Tight they were. Sexy? Well, not to my taste. The grunge movement in the ’90s brought looser fits to women’s jeans and it seems we never really got back to tight, sexy bluejeans for the ladies. Yes, we now have Spandex® yoga pants and leggings that are pretty good substitutes. Yet they still are not as sexy as a well-shaped bottom in soft, skin tight denim.

AMERICA’S SWEET TART

I had a spate of social media postings hit me recently with photos or blurbs about actress Marisa Tomei. It wasn’t her birthday (that’s in December, when she will turn 60) so the mysterious ways of algorithms just seemed to converge with Marisa in various feeds. Coincidentally, I also saw her recently in the 2007 film Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead on one of the streaming services.

Marisa as Mona Lisa Vito.

It led me to consider that Marisa has burned herself into pop culture thanks to her role as Mona Lisa Vito in 1992s My Cousin Vinny. Yes, it is 32 years old. Her Wikipedia entry recounts a long career in soap operas, the off-Broadway stage, and small movie roles before Vinny came along. And it is really a perfect movie: casting, performances, and the surprising ending courtesy of Miss Vito as an expert witness for the defense. And as good as Joe Pesci is as the titular character, it is Marisa’s Mona Lisa Vito who steals the show.

My Cousin Vinny came out during my first few years as an active crossdresser. Marisa’s wardrobe of flashy and short club dresses, moussed up hair, dark pantyhose, and even a flower print catsuit went right to the heart of my crossdressing soul. In fact, it still does. Her enduring popularity despite the character’s annoying personality and her fish out of water fashion sense is a testament to Marisa’s talent to skate right on the edge of “Oy Vey” and “Oh, Baby.”

Marisa won an Oscar for that role and was nominated two more times for later films. In a Seinfeld episode she played herself inexplicably attracted to George Costanza (“so bald, so quirky”). It played off her public image as the low-key dream girl for a generation of men. It didn’t end well for George. The rest of us can still dream.

DO YOU DANGLE?

I had a conversation with a crossdressing friend who wasn’t familiar with the concept of ‘shoe dangling.’ I was a little surprised because I assumed it was a well-known tease of flirtation either real or imagined.

The dangle.

Just to clarify, a ‘shoe dangle’ is when a woman lets one of her shoes hang from her toes (usually while legs are crossed) as pictured here. Whether the dangle is an intentional flirtation or an innocent unconsidered physical tic is sort of what makes it so fascinating when observed in nature.

I found a question posed to a Quora.com bulletin board asking, “Are women aware of the impact they have when engaged in shoe dangling?” You can tell by the way the question is formed that it has a profound effect on the inquirer. One woman answered, “I think so, yes. I notice that when I wear heels, I’m more likely to play around with them, slipping my feet in and out, dangling one when my legs are crossed etc. I am aware of the impact of this on some men (and women), but it’s not really a reason to do it, it’s just something that naturally happens.” Another woman answered that she shoe-dangles at bars to attract men whom she knows are drawn to the spectacle.

This can work for crossdressers. If you’re wearing pumps and hosiery, it is a very natural thing to slip the heel down and dangle a bit. You could do the same thing while wearing your male loafers but it cannot compete with the feeling of shoe dangling while dressed. So by all means dangle, ladies. Just be sure you can get the shoe back on if you do.

Tags: crossdressing, featured, opinion

Category: Opinion