It’s not that I’m worried about it, just puzzled, and as usual I think writing about it would sort it out in my head. There appears to be two spheres of my life, my two greet interests which are almost polar opposites. On the one side, I fancy myself as an explorer: I am captivated by stories of exploration and adventure – of how cook sailed into the unknown aboard Endeavour; I love seeing the natural beauty within David Attenborough’s programmes; I love to explore the world with Michael Palin. Fictionally, my heroes include James Bond and Jean-luc Picard; I love the suave sophistication of bond, how he always wins the day without a mark on his tuxedo. I love how Picard is a captain from the finest tradition of naval and dramatic history – well rounded, slightly reserved, yet flawed.

All these men get to see exotic places; they are all explorers. They are also very masculine, especially Bond who is quite a misogynist. I have this great wanderlust, this great desire to follow my heroes into the unknown – I want to sail thee seas in a sailing ship, I want to see the great barrier reef, I want to climb the Andes and the Himalayas, I want to sail down the Nile and see the tombs of the kings. While in no way do I think these male-only provinces, they are incredibly masculine things to do, and this raises my curiosity.

In other areas of my life, I desire the feminine. I relax by pulling on the trappings of femininity, or rather what I see as them. I love to pull on my leotards and tights; I love to co-ordinate my outfits; recently I bought an adorable blue party frock with a white trim from a charity store, and now want petticoats for it. I love the feeling of being zipped into it. I know it’s illogical – going to the loo in such a garment is a nightmare, especially for me – and I recognise that many see it as perverted. I just find it makes me happy, and see no harm in it. I might add that it’s important to me to keep these two spheres separate – I dislike, for example, wearing girl’s underwear under a suit, something very masculine.

Yet how do I square these two parts of me? Palin and Attenborough wear shirts and chinos when presenting, not tutus. How can I make sense of these two opposite sides? After all, it would not be wise to climb mountains in, say, pink fishnet tights and a ra ra skirt. As I say, I’m not worried about this per se – I do not lie awake at night questioning why I am how I am – but it strikes me as more than a little paradoxical. It seems that, just as I want to explore the earth, part f me wants to explore the feminine.

I do knot know the solution. Indeed, do I need to solve it? I think not, as long as it’s harmless. I admit it’s a sort of fetish, but I see no harm in being open about such things, lest we all become incredibly repressed. I also hope that I am not thought of any differently for being open about these things.