ally to be a case of "when in Rome do as the Romans do", which means that one's awareness of being in the state of womanhood

as indicated by the clothing etc. leads one to play the part of being womanly. Over a period of time the feeling of being womanly - or girlish according to age combined with the beginning development of a separate person- ality resulting from the interaction with other people takes on a quality of its own, a different state of feeling and being.

The clothing, makeup, hair etc. constitute a sort of uniform of femi- ninity and thus when one wears the uniform one feels more able and permitted to do the things, act in the ways, and express oneself in the manner that people who wear that uniform are expected and permitted to do. To use another analogy, the feminine finery becomes something of a doorway into a new and different world. Think of the doorway in a home which leads from the living room to the kitchen. Sitting in the living room and feeling hungry leads one to think of the food, the re- frigerator, the stove, the china and silver, etc., that would be involved in a dinner. Yet one can sit in the living room all evening and dream of dinner without assuaging one's appetite. However, getting up and going through that doorway, brings one into the kitchen the world of food. Now one can open the refrigerator, take out the meat, vegetables, milk, etc., prepare them at the sink counter, cook them on the stove, serve them on the china, and eat and enjoy them. In going into the kitchen through the doorway two things occur, one positively enters into a new room, a new world where different things go on, but one negatively leaves behind, or escapes from the old world, (the living room) where one's behavior was stylized to drawing room deportment. That is, one gets out of as well as in to in passing through the doorway. So it is with the femme-dressing; one gets out of the masculine clothing and the feelings and expectations and limitations that go with them, and goes into an entirely different psychic world in which feelings, motives and expressions present in one's psyche but unexpressable in the mascu- line world can now surface and be experienced and enjoyed.

This new femmeworld, that the feminine clothing (as uniform or doorway) allows one to enter, has its own requirements, limitations and sterotypes, but these are like the distant fence around a large back- yard — a small kitten introduced into the yard has lots of room to explore before it comes up against the fence. The femmiphile who enters this feminine yard likewise does not experience the limitations and stereo- types very quickly or very strongly. It is just a great big wonderful new way of living and its opportunities for bringing to the surface of

86