My brothers and I.
I grew up in suburban New Jersey, forty five minutes from Manhattan. Despite the bumpy road of my family life, I was upbeat. I had friends. I had a routine: school, put duct taped change on the railroad tracks, drink Jolt, play in the woods behind the library, eat Airheads.
When I was 13, my family moved an hour north into New York state. Rural. Very rural. They pride themselves in how dark black and nutrient their soil is for onion growing. I’m not even joking.
So when I think back on those four years I went to high school there and how much I slipped through the cracks, I can’t even imagine how hard it is to be out and queer there.
Let’s be clear — I WAS NOT out in high school. I was minimally teased for being a lesbian, which was both untrue at the time and now. “Oh, you’re bringing the LESBIAN to prom?!” my skinny, moppy-haired flavor-of-the-week boyfriend was asked. I was subsequently dumped.
I wasn’t out as anything, but I was different than most kids. I wore two or three t-shirts to hide anything resembling female anatomy. My clothes were all black. Black hair, black eyeliner (GUYLINER), lip rings, gauged out earlobes you could fit a quarter through. So when I think back on these years, I wish I had someone to help me out. Someone to validate how I was feeling. Shit — someone to validate how I felt when I was six.
In October of this year, I sent an email to my old high schools Gay-Straight Alliance advisor. I wasn’t sure how my offer would be received, but I wanted to volunteer my story to these kids. Even if there weren’t any trans-identified students, it could still broaden their understanding of people and their community. It could put one face to the T in LGBT. I didn’t meet a transgender person until I was 21. Yes, TWENTY ONE. (I just stared at those words. That’s unbelievable.) [Read full post...]
