When I was in my early to mid teens, Christine Jorgenson hit the scene. For those of you who don’t know, Christine was the first publicized sex change. How I envied her. I read everything I could about her.

This has no direct connection to my story but when I tell you the atmosphere at that time you may understand why so many of us were reluctant to admit to our desire to cross dress. Words like Fag, Queer, Pansy, Sissy, Sissy Mary, Poof and Daffodil were bandied about mercilessly to any male that even looked effeminate.

My sister, a year older than me, was getting married. She had two big problems; she needed someone to give her away (our father was dead set against this marriage); and a bride’s maid. Guess which I wanted to be. I was asked to give her away.

For a few weeks before the wedding she had her gown hanging in plain sight on her bedroom
 door  - talk about rubbing salt in the wound. Do I have tell you how many times I looked, yearningly,
 at that gown?

My chance finally came. I don’t remember why but my family was going to spend an entire
 weekend with relatives, who I did not like, nor did they like me. I was 16 at the time and old enough
 to spend the weekend by myself. I got “married” that weekend. I spent the afternoon in one of her dresses. It was the first time I wore a bra and stuffed the cups with oranges. I had the whole
weekend figured out.

Late in the afternoon I changed into the gown. It was beautiful; again, it was so long ago that I
 do not completely remember the gown, but I do know that it had a built in crinoline under the full
 wide-floor length gown. As I remember, the top was all lace, either sleeveless or long sleeve. It had
a  square (?) neckline. I placed it on the floor over two or three of her crinolines and stepped into it,
as I had seen my sister do so many times (but she did not use the crinolines), and pulled it on over my upper body. It was then that I realised I had a problem. There was no zipper up the back, just about
a million small buttons, actually about twenty.

I was able to button the ones below the waist and a few above but from there on I could do nothing.  I thought that my sister was just being lazy when she showed her friends how she looked in
 the gown and had them button it up for her. It buttoned all the way up the back to the top; I was able
 to button a few more at the top to hold it closed. The waist was closed and, the top, so it didn’t look
too bad. I put on the veil and carried around some fake flowers. I found out that it was not so easy wearing such a full skirt, as you had to be careful where you sat, you had to be careful not to knock things off the coffee table while walking past it, and turning around was a major undertaking; but it was well worth it. The simple act of going through a doorway was an experience in itself. I had to hold my skirt in at the sides as I stepped through.

Not wanting to tear the dress or get it dirty, I pretty much stuck to the living room. Then, the worst thing that could possibly happen happened: I had to go to the bathroom. I knew there was no way
 I was going to be able to go with the gown on; I didn’t even think I would be able to fit in the bathroom.

I had no choice but to remove the gown. I got out of it, did my thing then changed into her
“honeymoon” dress, the one she would wear from the house after the wedding to the hotel. At bedtime
I wore one of her old but sexy nightgowns, I did not want to take a chance of getting her new one wrinkled.

The next day, after eating breakfast in her nightgown, I wore a skirt and blouse until a few
 hours before the family came home. I double-checked several times to make sure that nothing looked disturbed.

That was the first time, but not the last, that I spent the weekend alone as the girl I wanted to be. That was in the 50s. I no longer want to be a girl; I lost that desire soon after but never lost my desire to dress as one.

To the best of my recollection the above story is true but age and time  seem to distort some things. I hope you enjoyed reading this as much as I enjoyed reminiscing.