#biquestioning

[noctiline]

sometimes i wonder why the idea of being close to a woman feels so different lately.

not just closeness…

but being held by someone older, softer, grounding.

i’ve come across the word “mommy” for it. and maybe that’s part of it.

or maybe it’s just a need i’m only starting to understand. either way, it feels real.

and even writing that feels strange. but also… a little honest.

[demisexual-polyamory]

Coming Out

Been thinking about it on and off because I don’t want to live in hiding

But I’m not exactly ready to fully come out as Poly.

Would it be weird to come out as Demisexual and Bi-something (biromantic or bisexual is still a mystery to me) and then again later as Poly?

[chinchillasluvs]

I thought this would be a funny meme 😀

[sonotstraight]

Of Boots and Converse

Hiya everyone!

Remember that funky mood I mentioned that I always get in before I leave a place? Well, now that I am back in my school town and it’s a long weekend here in the US, meaning not much to occupy my time today, I think I am experiencing a delayed reaction first to leaving Paris and Europe and then to leaving my family again. My last couple weeks in Europe along with my first few weeks back in North America were such a whirlwind of traveling and fun that I didn’t have time to get sad about leaving Europe. Then, my first few days back here at school were also so much fun (only one day of class so far but lots of partying and going out) that I am only now missing my family and the constant noise and activity that our family home always seem to have. To give you some perspective, my family has always been fairly large. Add to that we have pets that over the years have been as varied as dogs, ducks, lizards, geese, turtles, and parrots (always at least two different types at any one time and keep in mind that we've only lived in cities). So you can bet that we've never really had quiet time in our home.

In stark contrast, I have only two flatmates in my apartment here in my school town (not a city). One has basically moved in with her new boyfriend because I hardly see her but even when she is here with my other flatmate it is soooo quiet in the apartment. Too quiet. I feel this the most when I come back from visiting my family. Here in my apartment, I always feel like I’m the only one breaking the equilibrium because I am the one who plays music from my laptop or who badly hammers away at my guitar or something. Until I feel guilty for creating the noise and disturbing the silence. Well, at least one good thing is that I am now falling asleep at around the proper time at night and waking up at a proper hour in the morning. Finally. It only took 3 weeks! Then again, I went back and forth among 3 very different time zones in that time so I guess it makes sense.

But in honour of all those hours I wasted thanks to jetlag, I’d like to introduce you to a song I should have posted back then. The song, called Jet Lag, is a duet by Simple Plan and a French-Canadian singer called Marie-Mai. She used to look kinda like Avril Lavigne and I remember that I used to describe her as the French-Canadian version of Avril but she has gone darker (hair colour, dress style) and even has tattoos now. Personally, I think she looks way hotter now.

In the process of looking up the video for the song so that I could post it below, I just discovered that there is an English version of the song, where the duet is with Natasha Bedingfield. I love Natasha but I still prefer Marie-Mai’s version. Marie-Mai’s version is the version I had been hearing in France for the past few months and I like her voice. It also helps that she sings in French and, well, I think she is hotter than Natasha. :P

So here is the video:

Alright, so I meant to head right into the topic but my ADD kicked in and the result was the very long and unrelated intro above. My apologies.

In this post, I will finally be writing on one of the previously promised topics. Just so you know though, I got five responses. I know that sounds like a little but it’s not bad considering the number of followers I have and in any case I am always happy when people take time to respond, comment or send me messages. The only thing though is that four of them selected a different topic and the fifth was an enthusiastic reader requesting I write about all of them :). So, basically I don’t really have a frontrunner. Thus, I have decided to write about topics in the order in which they came in. And the first person requested I write about boots and converse in Paris.

When I lived in Paris a few years ago and again this last time, there were some things I noticed rather quickly about Parisian women. For one, they NEVER wear the sneakers that Americans wear. You know the sneakers I'm talking about. I’m talking about the normal sneakers that look like this:

Joking!

More seriously though, Parisian women and even young pre-adolescent girls do not wear sneakers that look like this:

I mean you might see a local wearing a Puma here and there (because it fits the small form look they like) but not any of the monstrosities above. I realize this is quite possibly a European thing since many women in Europe don’t seem to wear those types of sneakers either, a phenomenon which is very different from American women or women living on this side of the world. Sneakers are the go-to casual shoes for the young and indeed for many women in general on this side of the world. However, if I saw a woman wearing the above-pictured type of sneakers in Paris, I could be 99% sure that she was a foreigner. I remember wondering what Parisians wore when they ran for exercise, an activity that many American women in big cities do on a regular basis. But then I realized that I could count on one hand the number of times I saw people running for exercise in the streets in Paris. Yet most of the French women I met were slender although a few kept trying to convince me that the average size of French women was close to American women. As far as I know though and from my experience, the sayings about French women being naturally thin were very much in effect in Paris.

Back to the shoes situation…

Thankfully, before I went this last time, I remembered that Parisians preferred small form shoes because the last time I was there, my first purchase was black thin form sneakers to fit in with the French. That reminds me, if sneakers are out of place in Paris, white shoes especially white American-type sneakers are VERY out of place there. Again, anyone wearing those type of shoes might as well wear a bright neon light saying “Foreigner! Foreigner!” and more often than not the imagined sign could specifically be “American! American!”

Anyways, so thankfully since I remembered the sneaker situation from my previous stint in Paris, this last time when I went, my new (and first) pair of Converse was the only pair of sneakers I brought with me. Best style decision I ever made. Because Parisians LOVE Converse! Male, female, young, old, EVERYONE wore them. I saw lots of black Converses like mine. Of course, black would be popular. I mean it is Paris after all! But Parisians’ love of Converse goes deeper than that. I believe that I also saw Converses in almost every colour being worn by people in the streets and on the metro in the city. Green, blue, pink, cream, red, yellow, patterned. You name it, I saw it.

They are basically the only type of sneakers, worn by Parisian women, that is the same as the sneakers worn in America. Of course, the way they wear it is often a little different from the Americans.

For some reason I never picked up on the Converse love last time. And this time when I brought my pair, yes I figured it would blend in more easily but also, as I hope when I wear it here in the US, I really was hoping that it may help to pinpoint me as not straight to the hot queer French girls. Alas! That last hope was never meant to be in Converse-loving Paris.

Thinking about it, I realize that Paris may be where a certain kind of hipster girl gets her fashion sense from. Because in the same way that I find it hard sometimes to tell from dress style alone the straight hipster girl from the queer girl in America, I found it well frustrating to tell the straight girls from the gay/bi girls in Paris. The American girls that some people describe as hipster kinda dress like the girls in Paris (when the Parisian girls are being very casual) who in turn don't really dress different from many gay Parisian girls. At least with (North) American girls, not as many girls in general wear Converse and, as a rule, Converse helps make it is easier to figure out who may not be so straight.

T-shirt and jeans often help to complement the look, but here in the US they are not necessarily required because sometimes we just know, you know?

With French (and European) girls, it is a little more difficult. For example:

Were it not for the handbags I dunno. Many of the girls on the streets don’t even have handbags as often as I thought they would and even when they do it doesn't necessarily signify anything about their sexuality. Plus, basically ALL Parisian girls seem to have an innate sense of uber chic that makes it even harder to spot the queers, even when you get the feeling that maybe a girl might not be so straight.

Needless to say, all those Converse-wearing French girls f*cked with my already-fragile gaydar quite a bit.

I will still continue wearing my Converse though, especially since I am back in the US. I will still hope that they help to flag me as so not straight. And more often than not I will wear them with my black pants or jeans looking exactly like this (skinny legs and all):

Despite knowing that doing so will mean that, when the subject of dress style comes up, I will continue to receive half-playful half-serious accusations from my sister that I dress like a lesbian. Yes my friends, that's a new thing she picked up during the holidays when she saw how I dress nowadays on a day-to-day basis. If only she knew. Or maybe she knows already. Whatever I won't think about that right now.

OK. Enough about the Converse for now.

Wait. Before I continue, one quick note about sneakers to educate you masses. I also found that Parisians (women included) especially college age and younger, also like a certain type of high top sneakers. Kinda like basketball shoes but not quite. Similar to the ones worn by the lead male singer in the Jet Lag video I posted above. Not as poofy though. Also, the soles tend to be thin and the colour, including the soles, tends to be grey or black. If that’s your thing (and it is my thing too) then you can look into wearing that on a visit to Paris.

Moving on to other shoes favoured by Parisian women. Boots! My next favourite type of shoes!

I love boots. Love love LOVE them. With heels or without. Ankle boots, mid-calf length, knee-high or higher. I love them all! And whadya kno guys? Parisian women love boots too! And they look so very very sexy in them. Coupled with the fact that they often wear the boots with just leggings or tights (you hardly ever see bare legs in Paris), I had great views more often than not. God, the amount of times I caught myself staring...

Definitely, not hard to see why. In that second pic I can't even tell where the boots stopped and the pants (leggings?) started. And in case you are wondering, yes I have seen women wearing ensembles similar to that last outfit riding a scooter. Or a bicycle.

Hotness!

I could write pages upon pages about Parisian women and their fashion sense but I am afraid that I will bore you all and also I don't have the requisite attention span to sit and write more now. It's already taken me 3 tries to finish this post. So I will end now. I hope it wasn't too bad a journey for you while reading the post. If you are interested in reading more about Parisian fashion, I think this person's blog post is still mostly on point, although it was written two years ago.

Next post will be the next suggested topic!