I live most naturally in a world that doesn’t quite exist. The forest scene in “Portrait of a Lady on Fire.” The U.S. Women’s National Team soccer fields. Everything about the gen Z band boygenius.
When I say that this world doesn’t quite exist, I suppose what I mean is that it *does* exist, and it does so beautifully. I just haven’t always had the courage to be there.
Attraction is squirrelly to pin down. Because I can’t describe it perfectly, I’m reluctant to try. Even if I’ve always known, in a vacuum, who I am, that vacuum implodes when it meets the real world. I imploded with it, the first time I tried to traverse the two.
Nearly every time I’ve dated a man, I’ve suppressed a big part of my life. It’s a part that I’m still reluctant to name. None of the labels ever seemed to fit.
But when I don’t define my own labels—when I stay quiet, hidden, and small—the world gets to project what it wants onto me.
Then again, when I was openly dating a woman, and when I had a public-facing role on the Dyke Soccer newsletter, I still wanted to hide. I remember sitting on the ferry with my ex on our way to Fire Island. Not the gay part. Instead, we were heading to the traditional, old-school east coast hamlet where my family spent part of our summers growing up.
As we sat on the top deck of the ferry, looking out across the bay on what is undoubtedly a romantic scene, she made a small physical overture that I now can’t recall. Perhaps she rested her head on my shoulder. Perhaps she took my hand in hers. All I remember is that I recoiled.
Because we are both sensitive, emotionally-attuned, and communicative women, we talked about it. I remember expressing my hesitation about revealing our relationship to these semi-strangers on the ferry—the proverbial keepers of my inherited social norms. I remember her reminding me that, sometimes, it’s important to be visible. You never know who might need to see proof that there are indeed other ways.
I’m still tempted to say: so what? I know the secret world of my heart. I know the spaces in which I feel free. Isn’t that enough?
The problem with perfectionism is that it leaves others no invitation. If I stay hidden until I’ve perfectly nailed it all down—my gender, my sexuality, my desires—I leave no room for you, for them, for anyone, to bear witness.
Passing, in all contexts, requires a level of self-erasure.
Even just a few months ago, when I was dating a man, I almost refused to contribute to a friend’s zine on the basis that it was a space for queer artists. When the friend asked if I felt comfortable submitting a story, my response was long and apologetic: I explained that although I was (queer, bi—terms that still chafe in their lack of perfect description), I was also at that point in a hetero monogamous relationship, and therefore felt more like an ally.
What my response really said was: if I can’t do something purely, if I’m not fully committed to the cause, how dare I take up any space at all?
The problem of purity has plagued my queer life. Without divulging too much, I’ve been crushing on, and dating, women since my earliest years. On some level, I’ve always “known.”
I’ve always known. In a vacuum, I know who I am. I know where my desire leads. It’s in the media I consume, the stories I read. The worlds in which I’m most comfortable.
The problem is: those worlds are in constant friction with this one. The one that I technically live in. The one with the norms.
It’s taken me so long to realize that I don’t have to try to fit in everywhere to be loved. The old conditioning is strong: it’s hard, physically painful, to be in friction with external expectations. My instinct is to hide, to run, and to question (to doubt) my own self.
I’ve always known. I’ve just also come to learn that the world I know to be true is at odds with the world I’ve been thrown into, over and over again.
Sometimes the friction makes me angry. It’s like we’re all being gaslighted, constantly. It’s part of why I’ve drank so much at times. It’s part of why I’ve gaslighted myself.
Sometimes the only thing that’s true is watching Julien Baker dance onstage with Phoebe Bridgers and Lucy Dacus, all three of them in love and in a space the defies explanation. Sometimes the only thing that’s true is watching Tobin Heath collapse onto the field after Christen Press scores a goal in the World Cup semifinals, and hearing Megan Rapinoe tear up in the press box describing it. Sometimes the only thing that’s true is how “Brokeback Mountain” is a piece of fiction but surely, also, is not.
My perfectionism creeps in as defiance in my refusing to do research beyond what I already know. I don’t need a gender studies degree to tell me how I feel. I’ve been researching from the start: sneaking glances, sneaking moments, sneaking books out of the Scholastic fair in third grade and reading them in a day before tossing them in the public trashcan on the street corner. No evidence of my studies except the sweat on my t-shirt and the thoughts in my mind.
All I need is to keep leaving space for the vacuum in which I am safe to emerge. I’ve been here. No one who knows me is ever surprised. Maybe my efforts at camouflage weren’t as good as I thought. Wouldn’t that be funny? All my hard work for nothing.
Oh well. I’ve always been here, even if I’m not sure I’ll ever pin down where that is. I’ve been told that being messy makes me infinitely more lovable than my attempts at a perfect shell. I’m here, and this time I’m doing my best to stay. Maybe there’s someone who needs to see me, to see this, just as I’ve needed to see others before.
To state the obvious: the world is scary and dangerous and there are people who’d rather have us dead than be who we are. But my attempts at passing save no one.
In closing, here is a song—the theme to one of my favorite relationships in one of my favorite TV shows—that gets closest to capturing how it feels to stand at the edge between the true world and the given one. Happy end of June, and Happy Pride, whatever that means to you.
thank you for sharing - truly - it resonates deeply.
(and I also have memories of that ferry growing, although not quite as profound and reflective, more on the smell of cinnamon-sugar-y donuts and fried fish mixed in one)
- jess
Beautifully written. So honest.