A Thousand Ways to Do Gender

[affreca]

There's a point that I want to yell at people that "They've never been given a deliberately gender neutral name and it shows." I am starting to realize how much I internalized how my mother views gender. She told me a young age that she gave me a gender neutral name (though it was in the process of becoming more of a female name and is rarely used as a male name these days) so that people would have to meet me to learn if I was a boy or girl. Listing military service on my job applications (because veteran's benefit helps a lot when going for government jobs) would probably confuse more people if I didn't keep applying to jobs in which people knew me before the interview (I'm pretty sure being known has helped me get my last couple of jobs).

But that means I sometimes pick and choose what things are worth being feminine about. I don't wear makeup because I dealt with the fear of wearing it wrong by never starting. I foolishly spent years demonstrating I could be just a macho and drink hard alcohol. Lots of other thoughts follow on, but I'm not sure yet how to articulate them without being needlessly hurtful.

Comments

[thistleingrey]

Interesting. I blend because I've been so often the one non-male person in a group of male individuals; it's body language and conversational topic, too. In some ways I've ended up with "and" by force of will: if someone reads me as a woman, well, these are traits and interests and habits women also have; deal.

Some of that is time/place, I think. No one said "nonbinary" when I was a child or young adult, and I don't particularly see myself as NB, either. But I'm not sure how to interpret "being feminine about"--not sure what the phrase means because it has a lot of space, a lot of pockets.

[affreca]

That's a lot why I'm trying to take my time to mull before talking to much, trying to avoid sounding to "Not like other girls". I spent my teens and twenties often being the only woman (gaming and Navy). I mostly succeeded in blending in by not being attractive and being unfussy.

Around age thirty, I got into fiber arts as my major social circles and started working in gender balanced offices. The networking and support I get from the other women around are better than being one of the boys, and easier. They've taught be more options for being female. But sometimes the Wednesday lunch discussions of appearance maintenance make me feel alien.

Maybe if nonbinary had been a think when I was younger.. But there's a part of me that just gets annoyed that even that is buying into gender to much.

(Thanks for commenting. I mostly just wanted to shout to the void, but it's good to know that the void isn't actually empty.)

[thistleingrey]

It is also okay to shout to the void! I wasn't sure whether to reply, for my part.

Discussions of appearance maintenance aren't my thing, either. I paused earlier because I work with a few men who take that kind of care about physical appearance (cis-het men, if it matters); they're early-mid twenties, and to them their level of interest is normal. For men my age only self-conscious goths wore makeup, mostly for going out at night, and they didn't bother with cleansers or hydrating masks. *shrugs* Another way in which time/place can pertain, perhaps.