coming out

ok ok ok. so its confession time.

i've always had the feeling that i didn't fit into a neat gender identity pigeon hole. after all who really does? i suppose there are archetypes that society finds acceptable and to which we, the hoi poloi, are expected to aspire. john wayne for example. (marrion morrison to his mummy. christ no wonder he affected a deep voice and pugilistic manner.) what a guy.

then there are the strong women. the psycho sexual behemoths and their 1970s dead-wood dinosaur dogma with which unreconstructed, hairy arm-pitted, retired bra-burners scourge us wimpish males. the andrea dworkins and camile paglias of this world for example. although i notice that, aging gracefully, sister germaine now advocates toy boy joy. (all very well being unattainable when everyone wants to sleep with you. not quite so imposing a stance when no-one gives a toss. eh germaine?)

i guess my point is that we all have to navigate our own course along the paths of passion. and this may lead us round some surprising corners before we stumble over our own true nature.

in my case my friends saw it coming long before i did. all i know is that a couple of years ago i started to dance. i also began to learn to play the chromatic harmonica at the same time. no not while dancing, but in the same month. january 2005 actually. but that's a story for another time and place. and blog.

now in south wales there is not a strong male dance culture. hard to believe i know but none the less true. boys don't dance. they might do a bit of hanky-waving, bell-jangling Morris prancing if their parents happen to have been librarians. and they might have jived if they were teddy boys. but seeing as most of those are now getting to grips with their zimmers that tradition has latterly waned. so generally speaking the BDD rule applies. as i said, boys don't dance.

especially if they are over fifty. the indignity of it all for one thing. i mean imagine a man of some years supporting a not insubstantial tummy, waddling round the dance floor. jesus he'd be sure to curdle the milk wouldn't he? or at the very least frighten the horses. "well may be. but heck," i thought, "i'm going to give it a go."

despite the unease, and in one particularly sad case the disapproval, of my peers i've been writhing, as much as my sagging abdomen will permit, around the dance floor, at least once a week for 30 months. and i'm getting better. couldn't have got worse. i can now spin a lady and lead her through the intricate pathways of rhythmic motion from one end of a staccato brass and exuberant conga melee to the next. without either of us falling over.

but my new enthusiasm has not been without cost. as i dance i find myself more and more in contact with the ladies. ladies of all shapes, ages and sizes. not to mention levels of terpsichorean accomplishment and even, it has to be said, of personal freshness. and the more we touch the more i realise we have in common.

i find satisfaction in the physicality. with no booze in my veins i lurve the salsa rhythm groove dragging my feet over the tiles. i thrive on the intensity of the brief ecstatic relationships and, as my endorphins continue to recklessly bejewel the inside of my skull i find myself bouncing on the invulnerable high the following morning.

in fact i'm so in tune with it all that i think i must be one of them. i have to confess i don't even mind wearing a bit of boys' scent. nothing too over the top. a squirt of lacoste maybe, or the odd dab of paco rabanne. my friends' fears were obviously well founded.

it seems i'm more than just 'one of them'. in fact i've been getting so in touch with my feminine side on the dance floor that i decided its about time i came out and admitted exactly who i am.

so i take this opportunity to proudly announce to the world that i am in fact a lesbian.

anybody want to make something of it?

p&l