First, the legal silliness -

1) You affirm that you are at least 18 years of age or whatever age is considered legal adult age in your jurisdiction, planet, or alternate reality; 2) You agree that viewing adult-oriented materials does not in any way violate the standards of decency in the community or planetary system in which you reside, nor where you are currently viewing the material; 3) you certify that you are not in any way allergic to or offended by adult-oriented materials and if you are, you'll quickly get the hell out of here before your mommy catches you; 4) you state that you will not allow minors to have access to these pages in any way; 5) by agreeing to the aforementioned, you forego any claims against this site and its owners and hold same blameless and yadda yadda yadda blah blah blah. and so on and so forth ad infinitum, ad nauseum.

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" I ask myself more questions than Hamlet as I ponder which shoes to wear."

"All any girl needs, at any time in history, is simple velvet and basic diamonds."

-Eva Gabor

Careful grooming may take twenty years off a woman's age, but you can't fool a flight of stairs.

-Marlene Dietrich

"It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain an idea without necessarily accepting it."

-Aristotle

“He was a wise man who invented beer.”

-Plato

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I suppose it's way past time for me to update this thing with something more personal. Unfortunately, it's just not all that interesting, but I'll give it a try.

If you can do it in front of or behind a camera, any kind of camera, I’ve probably done it, in a career that stretches from Ektachrome, Microdol and Dektol to histograms and adjustment layers, from 16mm MoPic to BetaSP to digital camcorders, from pipe-and-drape to digital virtual reality. I’ve been a writer, reporter, editor, news anchor, producer/director, commercial producer, all-night-radio DJ, combat photographer, freelance video producer, fashion photographer…and one of these days, I swear I’m going to break down and find an honest job. No, really!

I knew I was just a little “different” from around age 5, far too young to understand exactly why people got so upset when I seemed to prefer my sister’s dresses to my Official Davy Crockett coonskin hat. While my childhood friends played Space Rangers out to rescue the Interplanetary Princess from the Venoblian space aliens…I just wanted to be the princess.

I never experienced any of the guilt or angst that troubled so many others. I simply learned early on to keep it to myself. After high school, I spent 15 years trying to be a regular guy. Obviously, it didn't work.

I was married for several years to a supportive and understanding wife, but she passed away just as we were starting to get involved with the support groups. After her death, I became heavily involved with the gender community, starting around 1985, first with Tri-Ess, then IFGE, and pretty soon with just about every group that came along. I served for a couple years on the first Tri-Ess national Board of Directors, and a bunch of IFGE committees. I was a regular at Holiday En Femme, Coming Together, Be All, Fantasia…did one of the first Southern Comforts. I lost count of the television talk shows and college lectures and newspaper interviews that we did in those days. But for a couple of years there in the late Eighties, we were a pretty hot item on the talk shows. I got so good at packing that I could actually pack for a 3-day en femme trip in less than 4 days.

After about 6 years of that, I was simply burned out, used up, tired of the politics and queen bees and the empire builders and the trannier-than-thou's, and around 1992 I just walked away from it all to get back to making a living. Donna never went away; she just quit all that insane traveling. Be All 2010 was the first event I’d been to in about 18 years.

For several years I lived with a woman who preferred me (Donna) to my evil twin (him) and who enjoyed photography as much as I did. We often went out for the day for no other reason than to get snapshots of each other. After she passed away a few years ago, I started spending more time doing studio work. It gives me a chance to try more creative digital things. My living room actually turns into a more-than-adequate studio.

These days I work three days a week as a male impersonator. I’m not able to travel very much any more, once or twice a year at most…so it comes down to Southern Comfort in the fall and a skiing trip in the winter (I raced downhill and giant slalom in college, and I occasionally succumb to the need to go really fast.)

I’ve used up my quota of words for now. Anyone who'd like to know more about me will just have to wait for the TV movie-of-the-week.

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I'm just a quiet, intelligent, educated old queen with a taste for fine wines, stretch limos, elegant dinners, cuddling by candlelight, and old-fashioned romance...trying to maintain a champagne lifestyle on a beer budget...a sexy old granny, not opposed to a sincere LTR with the right person.

And the "E" stands for elegant, dahling! At my age, I tend to look like Walter Matthau in drag if the lighting isn't good, so putting myself together for an evening out could take as long as an hour and a half. If you're coming to pick me up for a date, bring a good book to read while you wait. "War And Peace" would be nice.

The main problem with being a semi-retired old queen in South Texas is the lack of places to go and BE glamorous. Around these parts, "formal" means putting on clean Levis and ironing the T-shirt. (And I grew up in a part of the country where ladies actually dressed up to go out to dinner!)

No question about it -- I'm just a snow bunny at heart. I'm living in the semi-tropics these days, and day at the beach is great, or a weekend at the lake with the girls. But given my druthers, I'd ruther spend a week in the mountains skiing my buns off! There's nothing more romantic than strolling through the village on a cold, snowy night, hearing the snow squeak under your boots and watching the snowflakes floating through the pools of light from the streetlamps. Or sitting in front of the fireplace listening to the fire while Mother Nature dumps a foot of fresh for the powder hounds. I'm a hopeless romantic. Besides, I can't wear my furs at the beach.

I came out in a time and place where a girl could actually get arrested simply for going out in public wearing a dress. (And I was, once or twice. I'm a hardened criminal!) For many years, I was heavily involved with various support groups and organizations around the country (TriEss, IFGE, GCTGA, Renaissance, the whole alphabet soup of groups.) At one point, I think I was paying dues to almost a dozen clubs or support groups around the country. I was on the road 15-20 weekends a year to one event or another. For a few years in the late Eighties, we were a hot topic on the TV talk shows. I did many of them, and a lot of radio talk shows, and university lectures, even did a little lecture on GLBT issues at a police academy!)

These days I'm much more of a homebody. I just don't have the money for all that travel any more. I still get out with the girls once in a while, and there's the occasional dinner date. At home, I'm more comfortable in slacks and blouse, or my ratty old comfy robe. I spend a lot of time on line chatting with friends, or watching old movies on DVD or video, and I love taking pictures in my little corner home studio.

Nothing terribly exciting any more, just the nice, quiet old-queen-next-door.