Pub Nights
Xpressions ( not misspelled) is an organization for Crossdressers and Transgendered females located in Toronto, Ontario. It serves the zone known as the Greater Toronto Area (GTA) and has members as far away as Windsor, Kitchener, Niagara Falls and other regions within driving distance of the city. Naturally the largest membership group comes from Toronto and the GTA. Usually those who live a great distance away and can’t attend regular events sometimes combine their visit with another in-town activity, which makes the drive worth while. Membership is probably in excess of 100 plus but I am guessing there are only about 50 to 60 active members.
I became a member of Xpressions in 2010. This was just after my first wife died and I was trying to get involved with local crossdressers to find out what it was all about. Going out dressed was totally out of the question at that time, of course.
Xpressions has a number of functions every year which are based on the meet and greet principle. That is so there is as much social interaction among the members and the general public as possible. I might add at this point that Canada, and Toronto in particular, are very liberal places. (Confrontational interactions with the general public are very rare. A crossdresser visiting Toronto. can remain dressed the whole visit as it is very unlikely that one would be accosted while dressed.)
The main activities are:
Monthly Pub Nights. The second Wednesday of each month unless they coincide with anything major like Christ mas for example.
Monthly Dinners. A pre-arranged dinner at a different restaurant every month. Held at different locations for fairness to try to make everyone happy. (LOL.) Each member is responsible for her own bill.
Annual Xmas Gala and AGM. A three day event held in a hotel in downtown Toronto.
They also interact with other organizations and groups such as the Pride Parade and organizations which support the LGBTQ community. Toronto has an area known as the Gay Village, the center of which is Church Street. Xpressions has a close relationship with the Ottawa group also.
About a year after I had registered I volunteered to join the Board and went on the website improvement committee. This didn’t last long as I didn’t have a clue what they were talking about so I just remained on the Board as a general member for a while. The Secretarial position became available so I volunteered for that. I remained in that position for three years.
We had a change on the board with a new president and a couple of new faces. I was already on the board as secretary but I now took on the role of managing Pub Nights as well, which is really what I want to talk about here.
Xpressions’ Pub Nights
Once a month on the second Wednesday of each month we hold a Pub Night. It is held at the Fox and Fiddle, a pub, on Wellesly Street in Toronto. It is a good location because there is public parking almost next door, there is a subway station just across the street, and it is very close to Yonge Street, Toronto’s main thoroughfare. The afore mentioned Church Street is also a short walk away. The venue itself is a three-story building and we mostly get the second floor to ourselves. This floor is close to the kitchen and it has its own bar.
The object of this event is to bring as many people together and allow talk and discussions among members to make members feel as comfortable as possible being out with people just like them. Dressing en-femme is not compulsory which allows new or potential members, to come out and meet girls who have been members for awhile and learn from them. We decided to spruce up the event and add an information element.
So what sort of information was appropriate? We decided that the most important item was dressing and the how-to. To this end we arranged for people to come in and talk to us about the things that went into dressing a crossdresser. The subjects were usually wigs, makeup, jewelry and of course clothing.
In the spring our Ottawa friends, in May, put on what is known as the Gals Spring Fling at a place on the St. Lawrence river called Ganonoque. Just prior to this event we would have a fashion show put on by a clothing vendor with a definite spring tone to it. In the case of this show we would try to use a different vendor each time. The vendor was probably known to a member and was persuaded to put on the show for us, One vendor in particular had access to a dress warehouse and made arrangement for the girls to visit it.
Prior to the Xmas Gala we had another fashion show which was put on by a very good friend of Xpressions who specialized in plus size up-scale, used clothing. This fashion show would have a bling and evening dress element because of the upcoming gala. What was significant about the fashion shows was that, wherever possible, the members did the modeling. Apropos to the fashion shows the wife of one member gave us a show of hats, It was very well done and quite amusing. Another wife gave a jewelry show with jewelry she had made herself. This was also well received.
Makeup was usually covered by a pharmacy, or on rare occasions by a makeup company representative. A drug store chain in this area carried a brand of makeup called Cover FX. Apparently this foundation cream was developed by a hospital to help burn victims recover. It was put on the market and was quite successful. I believe it is now carried by Sephora. We had a representative of the supplier give us a talk about the product and makeup in general.
Wigs also were covered by a seller so we had the best expert advice available. Also a talk was given to help girls to buy wigs online.
By these means we gave the Girls the best professional guidance we could get.
Where new members are concerned, you would notice after a few months they would start coming out dressed, attend a monthly dinner and then the Gala. It would usually take about eighteen months to two years for a member to gain sufficient confidence to venture out in the general public.
We did get a sense of satisfaction that Pub Night acted as a nice gateway into Xpressions and ultimately crossdressing which helped build confidence in new members.
I resigned the position after two years so that someone with new ideas could take it over and it wouldn’t get stale.
On a personal note, after I had been a member of Xpressions for a while: I had reached the dressing stage, On one Friday following a meeting, I received a telephone call from one the the members with whom I had become quite friendly giving me some orders.
She told me I had to be dressed and ready to go out at a certain time the following Saturday evening. They intended to pick me up at my home and we (there were going to be two additional members in the car) were all going out to dinner. So Saturday arrived, and as I am sure you can imagine, I was as nervous as a cat in a room full of rocking chairs. The only condition I had insisted upon was that they parked across the bottom of my driveway to obstruct some of the view from the street. So I got ready and they arrived as promised. I slunk out of the house and into the car and off we went. We drove for about twenty minutes to the restaurant, and even though it was dark everyone we passed was looking at me. Or so I imagined. The restaurant wasn’t to busy so that was a little less stressful. Surprisingly nothing happened. I was not asked to leave and no one laughed at me or stared. Although for me, there was an element of tension during most of the meal. We talked a lot and slowly I became more relaxed. All in all, it was a very interesting evening. The journey home was nowhere near as stressful as the outward journey and I think we all came in for a night cap.
This of course was a pivotal point for me in my dressing. I then went on to the next stage which was going out dressed with others.
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Category: Out & About, Transgender Body & Soul
