Shopping fun? - Dress Barn
A few weekends ago Miss and I had a little (en-femme) shopping trip. I had been curious about what types of clothes Dress Barn has, so we went and checked it out.
I didn't find too much that I liked, but I did pick up nice top (no picture - haven't worn it yet). Miss and I found several tops for her that looked good on the racks, but when she tried them on she only liked one of them.
Here is what I was wearing that day...
We had a sales person checking in on us and trying to be really helpful. She welcomed us shortly after we walked in with a "Hello ladies" greeting. After a few minutes of looking around, we had an item or two in our arms that we had picked out. The sales person came back by and asked Miss if she wanted to start a dressing room, which she answered "yes, sure!" While we were doing our shopping, she would come by every few minutes and offer to take anything else we picked out to the dressing room for us. Miss was not a terribly big fan of this level of service, as she prefers to take care of herself (or have me carry our goods).
This sales person was very professional and attentive. At first I was confident that she didn't make me out as trans, but I can tell by a change in how she looked at me that she eventually figured it out. Of course there were other people shopping in the store, and I'm just guessing that some of them probably figured it out too.
Up to this point there had not really been any awkward moments, and no one made any uncomfortable comments or gestures. When we were done looking, we went back to where the dressing rooms were, and our sales lady was there and directed Miss to her room. But it seemed like she did this in a way that came off as if she was only offering entry into the room to Miss, and it seemed to both of us that she was purposefully not extending that offer to me. Maybe that's because she didn't want to assume we were a couple? I hope so, but her demeanor seemed to be become a little cold towards the end of our time there, so I wonder if she wasn't a big trans/LGBT supporter, or maybe this was her first in-person experience with a trans woman and she didn't know how to react to it.
After the sales lady directed Miss to the dressing room, she asked me if I wanted to sit while I waited. I told her yes, and she grabbed a very simple folding metal chair, opened it up for me and placed it outside the the dressing room entrance, facing the checkout stand. There were several people in line, and I felt awkward and on display while I waited for Miss to return. I played with my phone to pass the time.
When Miss came back out she said that my top wasn't in the dressing room, and she pointed out that she noticed it had been hung on a rack with miscellaneous other things. I'm assuming it was the return rack. So why did our sales lady do that?
I grabbed the top off the rack, we got in line and waited for our turn at the checkout. The lady that rang us up was perfectly nice and polite to us, and thanked us ladies for coming in.
I doubt we are going back.
Shopping fun! - Adult toy store
We also stopped in at a local adult sex toy store. I told Miss I was interested in a dildo that was more stiff than the ones we have. I explained that it was hard to get them in at first because they bend so easily. It's really only a problem at the start of play time. Once it's in and things stretch out a little bit it's not much of an issue. But it sure takes us out of the moment while we struggle to get it in - LOL! The funniest part is that Miss says she agrees and feels the same way, about them being too flexible!
Anyway, we get to the store and there are more cars in the parking lot than any other time we've visited. So of course I'm feeling anxious about how this will go. We enter the store, and were greeted very nicely by a sales lady, again as ladies. I felt like she didn't catch on that I was a trans woman - YAY!
We went about our shopping, and it didn't seem like anyone picked up on me as anything other than being a woman. We looked at many dildos, but none seemed any more stiff than what we already had. There were some in packaging and we didn't really want to try opening them for fear of damaging the packaging.
We looked at vibrators too. As we were doing this another sales lady came by to answer any questions we might have had, and she pointed out some of the ones she thought were good quality.
There was one that was VERY powerful that Miss looked at. Her eyes lit up when I turned it on and touched her hand with it. She took it from me and her smile lit up wide :-D I pulled a Debbie downer on her and told her that I had read that your v-jay-jay can get so accustomed to that much stimulation that you become desensitized and any stimulation less intense just doesn't get you off anymore. Of course I was feeling insecure a little about becoming less able to satisfy her myself, but then we *always* use a vibrator as it is for her to cum :-)
We were probably there for 30 or 40 minutes, and we needed more lube, so we looked at those for 10 minutes or so, and the sales lady again came by to ask what we were interested in and described what the different options are. I think this one had picked up on me being trans. I could sense that from the look on her face as she talked to us. It wasn't a bad look, just typical curiosity. We picked out some lube and checked out and that was that!
As I'm getting out more in public en-femme, with respect to getting past my anxieties, I am trying to change how I think about it, or more so how I feel and react when I feel my anxiety.
Lately I've tried to think of being out in public as me being something for people to talk about, and that I'm "promoting" LGBT acceptance by being out in public. Hey! I'm working for the cause! ;-)
I'm guess that I'm actually working on "owning" myself, my transgender self. My not always going to pass self. I think it's going good so far. And I know that as time goes on I'll get more and more comfortable.
Decades ago, in high school drama class, was my first time meeting a gay person in person. There were several in the class that I was aware of. I was very shy, I still am more than I'd like, and I found it a more comfortable feeling to befriend them than the other "normal" kids that I was somehow more intimidated by. I ended up keeping friends with them through high school. There were three of them, and they all graduated a year or two before I did. Two of them were guys, that years later I ran across on a web site or news article that they were a couple still. The third was a (lesbian) girl that I've not heard anything of since. I guess the point of this paragraph is that I subconsciously at the time felt more comfortable with people in the LGBT realm than my "straight" peers. They just didn't seem threatening to me like others. And with what I know myself to be now that makes a lot of sense :-)
I hope you've enjoyed reading!
Take care everyone!
