My desires to wear skirts came about because my mother dressed me as a girl until I was five when my father came home from WWII and put a stop to it. He was very set against it, wearing dresses or skirts even if your still being a man.
And I've been angry with him even though he died almos 20 years ago.
But recently at the funereal of my aunt, his sister, while discussing post WWII traumatic stress syndrom with my Aunt's daughter I began to realise that she had seen her father go through PTS. He was a medic at Anzio and had won a Bronze star with clusters but never discussed it with any of us. We found out after he died.
While talking with my cousin I realised suddenly that my father had been a cook in an Army hosiptial in India on the India-Burma boarder and within the Japaneese Theatre of War. Enough so he could join the VFW (Veterens Of Foriegn Wars, for you non U.S.A. members).
But as I talked I realised, while he wasn't in "action" with a firefights or landings or beachheads he must have seen the injures, sick and wounded being transported out of the battle areas. That's what an Army Hospital was and what he did talk about, including pranks played on each sounded a lot like something fro M*A*S*H. Canvas tents and bunks, etc.
So maybe I missed judged my father all these years.
Maybe his ultra conservtisim was his way to try and hang unto what he had fought for.
It was wasn't me he was mad at but the way the world after WWII was like.
And of course, having a son that wore girls clothes just reminded him of what he missed.
God, I wish I could back now and talk just once, meaningfully with both my parents one more time
So if anyone if having "family" trouble over their skirt wearing sit down and talk to them. Let them were you are coming from.
Dad and Mom assumed the worse, that I was gay or a drag queen, when nothing could be further from the truth.
Dennis A. Lederle
