Monday 18 January 2010

A weekend of outrageous gender stereotypes

On Saturday I looked at cars with my bloke friends, while on Sunday after a leisurely breakfast in bed and half hour spent browsing the Orla Kiely website with my wife I spent the day at the sewing machine doing a bit of dressmaking. Not for me this time, I was trying to finish a project for her that was meant to be ready for the end of summer but looks likely to be ready only just in time for the start of the next.

It sometimes pains me slightly that as a transgendered girl one of the things that gives me release is dressmaking. I come from a family of powerful women, all four generations that I have known as adults have forged successful careers in their own times which was no mean feat for my grandmother and her daughters generation. So that I've enthusiastically taken up one of the domestic crafts they strove to escape feels almost like letting the side down, as though I might be seeking to play at being female by drawing an outdated caricature.

In truth though both my weekend days were different sides of the same coin. I enjoy making stuff. It's therefore only natural that when given the opportunity to make stuff with a sewing machine instead of with a welder, I'd also enjoy making that too. I consider it a privilege that I've had the opportunity to do both.

Perhaps the world would be a better place if more genetic males who make stuff for cars and bikes followed my example.

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