"Exactly," I agreed, "because these actions validate their femininity and their ability to 'pass' as a woman. I've heard them go on about how much pleasure and satisfaction it gave them to have a clerk or a wait- ress say, 'can I help you, Ma'm or ‘yes, Miss, what can I do for you.' That Ma'm' and 'Miss' really sends them."

"Yeah, I can see that," Tom said thoughtfully stroking his chin. “If they are going to go to all the trouble, expense, and risk to appear as an acceptable woman it must be a great satisfaction to have somebody reward them that way, even if it is done without their real identity being known. Matter of fact, I guess it would be even more satisfying to them when the speaker didn't know and still talked to them and treated them as a lady, than if his true sex was known. And this bit about gender being different from sex is an interesting thing too. I never thought of it that way before, but I can see that the word 'sex' really ought to be applied only to things having to do with anatomy and reproduction because to use it to cover behavior outside of that realm is only confusing. Like when I thought that acting the role of a woman was a sign of homosexuality. I see now that the words 'man' and 'woman' really refer to the role you take in society regardless of what your genital anatomy might be. When you want to talk about anything having to do with intercourse or reproduction I guess 'male' and 'female' would be the only correct words to use and I suppose 'masculine' and 'feminine' are the words that one would use to describe a manly or a womanly person rather than a male or female person, and so they could be called gender words."

"How right you are!" I agreed, being pleasantly surprised that Tom, who was usually facetious and seldom serious, had begun to be inter- ested in and thoughtful about a subject that usually was very difficult to deal with because of the ordinary man's ignorance and prejudice. “You can see that to refer to 'female' clothing for example, would be ridiculous since clothing has no sex organs, but 'feminine' clothing or women's clothing would be right because they refer to the kind of clothing worn by a person (regardless of his anatomy) who is taking the womanly role in a social situation. What it comes down to," I continued my explanation, "is that the true transvestite is an heterosexual, male per- son (he loves females) who has simply become aware of the fact that there is a side to his total personality that does not fit smoothly into the cultural requirements and expectations of the man's role in contem- porary society and to express these traits would lead to unfair suspicion and accusation on the part of society. But more than that, he has been so conditioned during his childhood as to what is acceptable and what

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