Femme Knowing, Knowing Knowing

Some are born femme.  Some achieve femmeness.  Some have femmeness thrust upon them. 

Of course, it's rarely that simple.

I like to think there is some is some femme essence that has been with me always, long before I even knew what femme meant.  I like to that the inexplicable fascination I had with the sporty volleyball player who I tutored in algebra was my first authentic girl crush.  I like to think my secret obsession with the k.d. lang/Cindy Crawford cover of Vanity Fair came from a place of deep knowing.  I like to think that both my body and my subconscious knew before I did, and waited patiently for the rest of me to catch up.

Yeah, you know the one.

I am a notorious over-thinker.  Uncertainty gives me a certain amount of anxiety, so I turn things over in my mind.  I turn them over and over and over, convinced that there is an answer that someone with my intellect should be able to deduce.  Perhaps, despite undergraduate and graduate degrees in English, there is some engineering DNA hardwired in me.

My therapist has a different take.  My intellect, you see, has always been valued.  It has been praised and nurtured and it has served my well.  My instinct (or gut or soul or heart), on the other hand, has not proven itself in the same ways.  Moreover, the combination of analytical minds and Catholic indoctrination do not place a premium on feelings.

My therapist, lovely and wise woman that she is, has a saying.  Perhaps it is not so much a saying as it is something she has to say to me nearly every time that we meet.  "The brain," she says, "is an excellent servant.  It is not a very good master."

Each and every time that I begin to fret about my job or my weight or my relationship or my ex or my family or my future, she whips out this truth.  We talk about meditation.  I sigh because I am not very good at meditation.  We talk about sitting quietly, breathing deeply.  We talk about the fact that the answers--all of them that I need--are there.  My body knows, my very cells know what I need, what I want.  I know.  I've only to stop trying to figure it out and simply listen.