Q: Can you introduce yourself?
A: My name is D and my pronouns are she, her, mostly, but um, I don't care if people call me they or even if they misgender me, I'm like, oh, that's fine too. Yeah.

Q: How would you describe yourself in your own words?
A: I think for LGBT reasons I am more like a masculine lesbian. I would identify as butch. I think that's how most people would describe me. 

And, I embrace the word dyke. I think that it's a word of empowerment. 

If people want to be a jerk to me, I can say I'm just a big old dyke. And, I think that, that also has some ties to our queer ancestors who use those terms a lot to identify. Other than that, I mean, I'm white, I'm working in university. I'm middle class. I don't know. 

But as like LGBT I'm solid lesbian, even though that's kind of rare these days, I feel.

Q: What objects, everyday practices, or aesthetics feel tied to who you are?
A: I think definitely the way I present myself and dress.My hair is like short. I like to have it kind of like spiky and messy and give off this...don't fuck with me kind of attitude. Even though someone could just beat my ass if they wanted to. The way I dress sometimes it's super masculine, like t-shirt and shorts.

I do have,I do love, flowery shirts. So sometimes it looks really odd that I'm like this, like, really masculine, butchy kind of person. And I have this, like, flowery, flowy shirt on. I just kind of like weird shirts and stuff like that. I'll never be in a dress. I'll never be in a skirt. I'll never wear high heels. I'm in comfortable shoes. I never wear makeup.

Q: Can you talk more about the floral shirts?
A: Yeah, I mean, I don't know why. But I have noticed that, like, even trans men, um, you'll see them a lot of times in probably more feminine shirts than they would have worn before they came out as trans men.

Like, it's not flowing and it's not lacy, none of that. But if it's a print that I like. Like Jimmy Buffett, do you know what I'm saying? 

I don't know if it harkens back into when I used to try and pick things that I thought my mom would like to see me in, you know? And try and, like, fit into being somewhat feminine.

Q: Can you talk about your wife and your relationship?
A: Yeah, we've been together we've been together 27 years. We got married in 2014. So that's 12 years we've been married. We were friends for seven years before that. So that's 36 years or something crazy.

We met at work. We both used to work at Little Caesars and she was my boss. And, she's six years older than me. And we were really good friends for a long time.
 She was straight at the time.

For seven years, we were really good friends. I guess she came around.

Q: How old were you when you met?
A: When we met, I was 18 and she was, like, 24. And now she's 58 and I'm 53. So, it's more than half our lives we've known each other.

Q: Do you have kids or pets together?
A: We don't have any kids. We do have two dogs. At one point we had four, which was way too many. We've lost a couple over the years just to old age.

So we have two, we have a border collie and we have a big old hound...both rescues. We treat them like our children.

Q: What first drew you to the butch identity?
A: Even after I came out for a long time, I had, like, it wasn't long hair, but it was shoulder length hair. Like, around my family, when more of my family was still alive and around my mom, I just felt self-conscious to be very obviously Butch-y.

It's been over time that I've just become more confident, like, I've always been confident, but I've felt that I can be myself without alienating anybody else.

Because the people I'm around now, like, the people at work or my friends, they know me now as this. And, I don't go back home anymore to see old relatives, because they're mostly dead. But it was ... I would say this is my true identity. Whereas before, I just kept trying to pad it, you know, to make it, like, more palatable to people.

Q: Were there things that held you back from identifying as masculine?
A: Yeah, I mean, I think I mentioned it a little bit already, this perception of family. And, I came out to my mom, but I didn't come out to the rest of my family. Like, they just figured it out, or my mom told them.

So, you know, and especially, I had folks who lived to, like, really old. So, if I'm going to my 80-year-old great aunt's house, I don't want her to think I'm big and scary.

Again, the job market thing held me back, I think. And then, I think just, you're programmed for so many years to be, like, this is what you're supposed to be, and here's the options, you know?

Q: Did stereotypes around butchness shape how you understood yourself?
A: Yeah, that's a really interesting question because I was just thinking that back then, like, there wasn't a lot of representation. But then there also wasn't a lot of representation. So, you didn't have the internet to go to to figure out either way.

You didn't have, like, Butch Yahoo, Butch Facebook group or masc for masc, whatever. We didn't have that many niche labels and stuff.

And I don't know. I don’t know that we really thought about what we might be like, yeah, I'm butch or, yeah, I'm dyke or whatever. 
But it wasn't ‘I belong to this community’ because there wasn't enough people out to be like, this is a community I am belonging to.

Q: How long have you lived in Tennessee?
A: We've been here 20, about 26 years.

Q: How would you describe Knoxville?
A: I used to, a few years ago, I was, this is how I always said it. I would say it's ‘it's a big town in a little city.’

Yeah. But now I feel like it's, it's a little town trying to be a big city. 
It's just growing way, way, way too fast.

Q: How has living in Knoxville shaped your identity?
A: That's a good question. I think two things. I think when I lived in Atlanta, I mean, I was younger also, I was in my 30s then, but Atlanta is for shiny people, right?

It's fast-paced.

It's for these young professionals who are on all the time. You had to be dressed up all the time.

Here, you are who you are. Like, everybody just is, like, regular people. Nobody's trying to, like, outdo anybody else.

Q: Are there ways you show up differently depending on where you are?
A: Yeah, as far as appearance.

In Atlanta,  the bars were just a lot more higher end, right? And so I remember one time this group of us...it was called the Lesbian... it was called Fourth Tuesday, but anyway, it was like a lesbian group that met every Fourth Tuesday.

And I had on my, my LSU cap, you know, and everybody looked at me like I was crazy, right? Because I was, like, out of place.

You don't wear a baseball cap to this bar. And I feel like if you would wear a baseball cap to Corps or to XYZ or anywhere else in Knoxville, like, you know, they'd be, like, go Tigers or something.

Q: Do political climates affect your comfort and visibility being butch?
A: It's something that I think about depending on where I am.

Like, if I'm on campus, I feel okay for the most part. If I'm, uh, out in South Knoxville, and, God forbid, if you go out to Seymour or, you know, anywhere on the outskirts, like, I would really be hesitant to. Like, we really don't, or we really try not to, go too far out of the city.

Because, you never know if you have to stop and get gas or something, you just never know what's going to happen.

Q: How do other people’s perceptions affect your self-concept?
A: I think at this point, I don't really.

But, a couple years ago, I got breast reduction surgery. I wanted to get top surgery, not because I'm trans, but just it's a lot.

And that has had a huge impact on how I'm able to present myself. I see myself rather than the way I was.

Because that always was a clash. I was always, like ‘well, I don't feel like I'm a person who should have, like, gigantic breasts, right?’... but that's what I was given.

Q: What stereotypes have you encountered about being butch?
A: I think they expect you to be mean. I think they expect you to be aggressive.

I think that they think that we're not sensitive, that butch people are man haters.

And, not that all those things are bad, but I think that they automatically attach some traits to that.

Q: How does your identity interact with queer communities where you live?
A: I think that the event that you held was really telling. Because, even when there are events that are lesbian focused, sapphics or whatever...for some reason, I always attach femme to those things for some reason.

And it wasn't until I saw your event where I was, like, ‘oh my god, like, there's a place just for us, right!’

Because even if I'm in a group with other lesbians, if they're totally femme, I feel like I don't have that much in common with them.
Q: How do you see the butch identity evolving?
A: When I think of butch, I think lesbian.

To me, those two things used to go together, but I totally see how you can have a trans woman who's butch.

It's interesting that they, if that's how they identify,not only how they present, but as how they identify.

Q: Why do you think younger people sometimes associate older butches with anti-trans politics?
A: It's true that there are some older lesbians who feel that way. And I think then that younger generations just think, oh, well, all older people must be that way.

The boomer women that I know who are TERF-y, they were in college growing, coming of age during the women's liberation movement.
And they had to fight so hard just to get basic human rights as a woman.

Q: How has technology changed butch visibility and community?
A: I think having the internet, being able to see videos and pictures of people who are just true life, just regular true people is very interesting to me.

There's a few people that I follow on TikTok who might be butch femme, but then I know at least one is, like, butch butch.

And, it's always a novelty when I come across those things.

I think the internet is so good for so many things, but then again, it can be so bad.

Q: Do you think online visibility changes how people think about butch identity?
A: Yeah, I think the difference between how you present versus how you identify.

Until your event, because Butch identity was basically ignored as a thing, like, I didn't even think about it. 

I just went around. I just went through the world, like, you know, this is who I am. This is how I dress. This is how I look.

But since your event, it's made me think a lot more about my identity, my wife's, how we seen together as two Butch people.

Q: Did the event make you feel differently about community?
A: I think I definitely feel like your event provided field of space that was empty, or at least lacking.

Like, oh, there's finally something for us.
I thought we were going to show up, and it'd be, like, me and somebody else.

And I think there must be even more people out there.

It's just something I just thought would never happen. And I didn't expect it. But when it happened, I didn't know that I needed it.