hinge and what i think i deserve

i've been experimenting for the past 2 months. 

i downloaded hinge half as a joke and half as a reminder that i wasn't the only futch-seeking-futch lesbian on the planet. ive met lots of people, gone on a couple dates and 1 (one) second date. it's been... okay.

mostly i've realized im woefully unequipped to be intimate with anyone. i thought for a while that eventually it would come to me and i could be suave and charismatic and understand signals and act on them but that hasn't happened. not yet.

i've also realized, surprisingly, that i am wanted! for various reasons! i mean you receive that validation from most dating apps. people are swiping or liking or tapping or whatever based mostly on what you look like. its a given, if you match, that they find you physically attractive. which is neat!

but also, romantically speaking, knowing that people enjoy your conversation and like hearing you talk is also very nice. 

hinge has been a mostly positive experience in that regard (other than a ghosting I don't think I'm fully over), but it's also made me think very seriously about where I am on the... lesbian spectrum.

well, that and something else that happened. but i'll get to that.

maybe i've talked about this before, but i've seen myself as a futch. regardless of how masculine i dress, "futch"or "stem" is/was the label i would use because i don't consider myself fully masc. i don't feel that i could ever be comfortable presenting fully that way. it's difficult to think about. 

being fully fem? i could imagine it. maybe if i lived in a different body. maybe if i wasn't as tall as i was or as broad-shouldered. maybe if i didn't look so weird in a dress. maybe if my waist curved in a little bit more.

Being fem feels right. Being masc looks right. So I have an unhappy medium. 

That's not to say I don't like dressing more masculine. when i'm in the right headspace i can enjoy it. but i've noticed, especially since using hinge, that that headspace is dependent on who i'm around, who i'm interested in, etc. 

i like all types of people. however, i've found there's a specific type of girl that likes me. unless i go out of my way to seek otherwise, i'd get several likes from femmes or hyperfemmes that had "need a tall masc <3" on their profile. and when we start talking i start to feel reduced to a thing. or one idea. i hate it, and i play into it.

i've had genuine frets over girls liking me, lamenting to friends that i would inevitably have to take the "male" role in the relationship (yuck). I was hyperaware of how I was being perceived, knew i didn't like it, and yet it shaped me subconsciously. i'd been very prickly.

but i had a very positive experience with a masc lesbian recently. like stereotypically masc lesbian. you know.

and it made me feel good? and more feminine? like yeah, i knew i could be perceived romantically and sexually (yippee!) but this was a group i had long since avoided since it felt to unachievable (at least here and now). 

these are very much non-problems and this is just word vomit but i wanted to get this down. so yeah