I don't know any quilters with only one sewing machine. My mother and I are below-average; together we have:

1) 1950's Singer Featherweight (the little ones in the carrying cases).

2) 1967 Singer Touch-N-Sew (my mother's high-school graduation gift).

3) Early 1970's Nelco (defunct Taiwanese brand, but the machine has all metal parts and will probably outlive me).

4) My paternal grandmother's huge, black, 1936 Singer, complete with Art Deco desk cabinet.

You can't kill an all-metal machine unless maybe you throw it in a lake. When Mom took the Touch-N-Sew for service about ten years ago (first time it had ever been in to the shop), the guy asked her if she ever used it. We laughed: Mom has used it constantly for 40 years, sewn tents, canvas, jeans, everything on it and it's never needed any real work, just cleaning and oiling.

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And don't sweat it, Fibula. I was a dirt-eating tomboy as a kid and still grew up to be a cookbook and needlework enthusiast. I'd have made a great 1950's housewife, except I'd have had the Maddox Brothers or Son House on the hi-fi while I vacuumed and dusted knick-knacks. Who cares if the neighbors talked?

I use it to keep myself in affordable vintage clothes/avoid sweatshop made stuff (recycling and humanitarianism know no gender-imposed boundaries, after all). If you really need to de-girlify the sewing machine, think of it as another kind of power tool. I like to know how to do stuff: Sew, cook, fix cars, pattern-draft, etc.

You know who else quilts? S. Epatha Merkerson, the actress who plays the tough police chief on "Law & Order".