Hermione/Paulina

I've just seen my first credible femmeslash pairing - in Shakespeare's The Winter's Tale of all places. I mean, I'm sure there are tons of credible female pairings, but this is the first time I have watched canon and thought - there should be a relationship there, between those two awesome and strongly bonded women.

I feel like I don't see enough awesome and strongly bonded female characters where I think to myself, "Hmm, there's something here they are not exploring." I wonder why that is?