Transvestia

her own. This is the beginning of a separate per- sonality--the childhood as it were of what Susanna so appropriately named the "girl within",

Somewhere in this development "she" chooses a girl's name for herself. Have you ever stopped to consider that in most cases this is a very real ac- complishment. Boys and men are generally exceedingly careful to avoid giving any show of femininity to others, This reflects naturally in a fear of admit- ting such a thing to ones self and is, of course, the basis for the guilt feelings so characteristic after a session of dressing--in the early days that is. So to actually face up to the existance of this fem. inine anima within himself and to give her a girl's name thereby making her "real" and somebody to talk about--because she now has a "handle"--is truly an accomplishment in self acceptance.

The last big, intangible benefit of being a cross dresser comes when the individual really be- comes what I have termed an "FP" or femmepersonator in contradistinction to just a transvestite--a cross dresser, When he really has brought his anima to life and freed the "girl within" to be a person in her own right he has accomplished a final big break- through. This consists of coming to recognize that very little in life is tied up hard and fast with the fact that one is male or female, but that in actual- ity all aspects of living are available to all people; that the ideas of man and woman and masculine and feminine are cultural inventions for all their as- sumed usefullness, Everyone is arbitrarily denied the rights to one half of his or her own soul and innate humanity, When the FP learns to accept HER as well as HIM he has accepted the total self and this is indeed a freeing of the spirit the like of which no non-FP could understand.

"'BYE FOR NOW, VIRGINIA

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