26 August 2010, 9:00 am
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Adventures of the Boi Wonder: Dining With Straight People
Tags: Advice, coming out, Commentary, friends, Ideas, theT, transfolk
This post was submitted by Levi
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“Old friends
memory brushes the same years
silently sharing the same fears”
–”Old Friends” by Simon and Garfunkel
In the middle of the month, I saw two old friends in one weekend (separately and in two different cities about 100 miles apart). Both of them are heterosexual cisgender women, both have known me since my high school days, and both are extremely intelligent and open-minded. In addition to all that, I had come out to both of them through electronic media months beforehand.
Even though I had told both of them via text messages or email, I was still very nervous about how it would turn out in person. As we know, direct reactons can be vastly different than those over a screen. I was hesitant to bring it up, bit knew that it was an important thing to discuss. It wasn’t the only or the most important thing I wanted to talk about, but I had to know how they felt about it and make sure they got the “situation” (which now sounds like an STD to me because of the Jersey Shore).
Of course the meetings and women are not completely alike, and each was treated differently. The second (and less nerve-wrecking) meeting of the weekend was with someone I had met up and talked to several other times during the summer, a high school classmate of mine. She and I have a history and comfort about sharing the messy, confusing, private issues & incidents of our lives and being able to listen, attempt to help, or just sympathize (often with a lot of dark humour thrown in). My “situation” is treated no differently, for which I will forever be thankful for, though she did admit that she had some trouble understanding on a personal level what I was going through.It’s understandable, I can’t even say that I have it ALL sorted out myself. I did my best to try to explain and we just enjoyed our evening.
The first meeting of that weekend was rather anxiety-inducing to be honest (didn’t help at all that I had just explored the city of Philly for the first time while running off of two hours of sleep). This meeting was with a former teacher of mine, who I had not seen at all since I was 16. Not only that, but from her response to my coming out email I was not exactly sure how she felt about my announcement (interestingly enough, it was this column that lead me to come out to her, because she had always encouraged me to write more when I was her student). I hold an incredible amount of respect for her, so what she thinks means a lot to me. So, I was anxious the whole time, my head swirling with things like “What name will she call me?”, “Should I ask her to use male pronouns or just let her flow with what is currently comfortable to her?”, “Should I even bring up the trans or the queer thing at all?” Thankfully, I did not have a panic attack, but I did only graze at the subject. These things are kind of like a complicated and non-contact dance for me. A day or two later I had to outright ask via text message if it was awkward or uncomfortable, because I was almost pacing back and forth with anxiety. Her response greatly helped to put me at ease, though these things are a journey for both parties involved. This one has really only just started.
I would like to think that I am doing my best to try to consider the other people in my live and their feelings and thoughts. I don’t want to drive these people away, either with my transition or my lack of concern for them. If that weekend was any evidence, I think that I am doing pretty okay with that delicate balancing act.
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It won’t matter to the people who care.
about you, I mean :)
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