QueerTips

I started to find butch women in movies and books and queer erotica, and they captivated me. But in those precious few portrayals, butches were paired with femmes, and that dynamic left me hopeless. Based on what I watched and read, femmes were petite, curvy, pretty women. How could I be femme if I was too tall, too broad-shouldered, too strong-jawed? How could I be femme with my flat chest and scarred face? The butches I saw in fiction didn’t want a woman like that. The one dynamic that was presented to me led me to believe I couldn’t exist in queer spaces. So I stayed in the closet, in the dark of my own doubts and insecurities.

But the quiet certainty of queerness didn’t leave me. I thought, sometimes, I’d go crazy if I couldn’t touch another woman.