Every year cross-dressers migrate to my hometown like hundreds of brightly plumed birds to attend Esprit, a cross-dressers' convention. Why they choose tiny Port Angeles, a Washington state mill town with little tolerance for men in lipstick, is anyone’s guess. But once a year, groups of tall, well-dressed ”women” stroll around, enjoying the sights and spending money. Which means it’s time for any self-respecting female to dress a bit better and sport makeup when she leaves the house. Otherwise, a bunch of men will show her up.

“I wish I looked like that in a pair of slacks,” a girlfriend of mine mutters into her drink as we sit in the hotel lounge. A cross-dresser with a pert butt, loads of blonde curls and a Coach bag sashays out of the bar.

These men dressed as women attend the Esprit convention to network, party, and take classes on everything from sexual reconstructive surgery to “how to move like a woman.” I ask to sit in on some of the ”girlie” classes. Since no one ever taught me how to wear makeup or walk in a womanly fashion, I wanted to find out how guys learn to be girls.

“Honestly, sometimes I go to the mall and watch women and girls go by, and I say to myself ‘American women just do not know how to take care of themselves,’” says Harriet Stites, one of the convention’s organizers.

I instantly regret wearing chinos and a striped T-shirt. I could use some lipstick too. Harriet is a well coiffed middle-aged man in a white blouse with shoulder pads. I notice this because I touch his shoulder as we’re trying to figure out how to fit me into the busy schedule for the seven-day conference. That’s my first brush with cross-dresser confusion. I would never touch a middle-aged man this way, but I treat Harriet like a fellow female instantly.

“You never know what a woman goes through till you walk a mile in her shoes,” sighs Charlotte as he’s having eyeliner applied by Domonique, a genetic gal (G.G. in cross-dresser parlance), in the makeup seminar. Charlotte has strawberry-blonde hair and bushy eyebrows. He sits with his legs gaping open, stretching a red wool skirt in directions it was never meant to go.

All 10 ”gals” at Domonique’s daytime makeup class have brought their makeup kits. One ”lady” has a purple tackle box labeled “Kat’s bag of tricks,” carrying everything from Clinique to Wet ‘N’ Wild. Jane, trim in size 6 Guess jeans, leans into every bit of advice Domonique utters, then tries applying lipstick with a shaky hand. Remember the subversive thrill of early makeup use? Sneaking mom’s blue eye shadow in fourth grade? That feeling fills the room.

“You’ve gotta be bold to buy makeup” says Stephanie, who’s showing off a jar of $80 Christian Dior rejuvenation cream. Stephanie talks proudly about the time he walked right up to an Estee Lauder counter in a department store and requested a makeover. I relate more to Jane, who flashes a bottle of Clinique’s Dramatically Different Moisturizing Lotion, then tucks it quickly back into his purse, as if he’s showing me a gram of coke. Or a secret. Cosmetics always seemed a forbidden pleasure to me, attractive but girly. And girly was never how I wanted to be perceived.

The smell of my favorite perfume, Thierry Mugler’s Angel, wafts through the room. I’m not the one wearing it.

Later on I attend a movement class, taught by Domonique again. This time I’m working it a bit more. Lipstick, platforms, and tight black bellbottoms. Proud to be a woman even though my butt will never be as good as that ”gal’s” I saw in the bar.

Domonique tells the packed classroom, “Real women never show their armpits, inner thighs or palms.” Then she has everybody practice entering a crowded room. Enter. Pause. See where you want to go, then move slowly toward that place. Back up to the chair ‘til it brushes the back of your legs. Slowly lower yourself. Cross legs at knees, arrange at angle to lengthen look. Done.

I watch man-in-skirt after man-in-skirt enter the room, pause, and go through the motions. They’re good listeners, entering the room regally and sitting gracefully. Everyone has gone but me, and the ”ladies” clamor to see how a real girl will handle the assignment.

I am Frankenstein. I really try, but I do my usual clump and plop. What’s worse, I hold my hands up, limp-wristed, in an attempt to look feminine. I look like a clumsy woman trying to impersonate a gay male.

Domonique shrieks, “What’s with those hands?” and one of the cross-dressers declares, “See? It isn’t as easy as it looks, is it?” I am humbled. The ”ladies” are vindicated.

These men live for this weeklong convention. They change outfits five times a day, get manicures and talk endlessly about favorite shopping places. (Ross Dress for Less is a favorite, but they call it Cross Dress for Less.) The end of the Esprit convention is emotionally tough for the closeted cross-dressers, because it represents an end to the freedom to be feminine they’ve enjoyed all week. The ”ladies” pack up their high heels and sequined gowns, put on their guy clothes and go back to their guy lives. It’s a shame when it comes to an end.

I ask Harriet Stites what makes a cross-dresser’s take on femininity different from a woman’s. “We never, ever take it for granted,” he says.

As I clump to my car, I make a mental note to dig that perfume out of the depths of my medicine cabinet when I get home.

Anne Erickson is a freelance writer and TV producer in Port Angeles, Wash. She also wrote “Susan Powter: Whoa! She’s got strong opinions.”

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