What Alison Bechdel and her father have in common goes beyond genetics. They share a common sexuality and confusion over their gender expression. Alison explains this confusion over her gender expression several times in the novel, once even begging her brothers to call her Albert instead of Alison in the cab of a tractor, “As the man showed us around, it seemed imperative that he not know I was a girl.” (113). Alison is acutely aware from a young age that this man objectifies women and that perhaps it was not safe to identify as one in his presence. Likewise, her father tells her he wanted to be a girl, recalling not only the time he dressed in a woman’s bathing suit in college (120) but also how he dressed in girl’s clothes as a child. (221). This scene is where both of them admit to having done drag and made love to people of the same gender is the closest to a mutual coming-out that they share. Face to face, this interaction is awkward, with Alison constantly looking wide-eyed and straight-ahead, communicating that she was uncomfortable during this conversation, yet intrigued by its openness.
When Alison first finds the photo of her father in the woman’s bathing suit, she assumes it is a fraternity prank as the singer from The Magnetic Fields bemoans, “I’ll never see that girl again, he did it as a gag, I’ll pine away forevermore for Andrew in drag.” in the song “Andrew in drag”. The lead singer of The Magnetic Fields, Stephin Merritt, sings about how he’ll only love Andrew in drag and how he is not attracted to other men or women, just Andrew in drag. Alison and her father never discuss being attracted to someone in drag or how much their sexualities have in common, but both reveal they have dressed in drag and wanted to be another gender, hypothetically so their sexual desires would feel more “normal”. Stephin Merritt identifies himself as male in the song but unlike Alison’s father, he is proud of his sexuality and this gives him the confidence to sing about it so openly.
Video for “Andrew in Drag” by The Magnetic Fields. Warning: video contains brief nudity and homophobic slurs.