KarMel Scholarship 2005
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“Grey Area” By
Beril Elgun |
Desciption of Submission: “Semi-fictional short story that is loosely
based on my life and experiences. Is it
not written grammatically correct; it is written in the voice of a rural,
working class transperson.” - Beril
It’s not that I didn’t
want to be a woman, it’s just… well things don’t always go the way you expect
‘em to. That’s why I’m here right now,
sitting in this grey waiting room signing forms and such. Everything in the room is grey. The chairs are grey, the carpet is grey. Only thing that’s not grey is this cheap
painting on the wall, like the kind you’d see in a hotel room. It’s funny, the grey I mean, ‘cause that’s
where I reside. In the
grey area between male and female.
Been there my whole life, I guess.
When I was born, the
doctor told my mom she’d had a baby girl, and she believed him. That’s the way it works, you see. You come out all kickin’ and screamin’ and
they pry your chubby lil’ legs apart to take a look at what ya got down there. If you got a vagina, they say, “It’s a
girl!” With those three words, your fate
is sealed.
It all went well for a
coupla years. Mom put me in dresses of
pink and such. Oh, and those ugly little
shiny black shoes with the bow on top.
Can’t say I minded much at the time, though. I think I was too busy barfing and suckin’ my
thumb and doing whatever it is little kids do.
It was later on, when I
was seven or eight that I started getting’ jealous of Danny, who lived across
the street. He always had cool toys, ya
know, action figures and miniature cars.
For some strange reason all I got were dolls and such. It was also ‘round this time that I was able
to wear pants and shirts and sneakers, even if they did have flowers on
‘em. That was good, ‘cause
it’s hard climbing trees and running through the woods playing cops and robbers
in a dress.
The worst was
Sundays. Boy, I HATED Sundays. Dreaded ‘em. Had nightmares about ‘em. See, Sunday meant church. It wasn’t that I particularly hated church. Sure it was boring at times to sit there
listening to the minister talk for what seemed like hours. But it wouldn’t have been that bad, ‘cept for
one thing: Dresses. Frilly, pretty dresses. Every Sunday. Oh, how my mom and I fought over proper church
attire and why it mattered. For some
reason, it was real important to her that God saw us lookin’ our best. I never understood that, I mean she was
always sayin’ God was watching us and stuff.
He never seemed to mind when I was messy and dirty, wearin’ my blue
jeans with the holes in ‘em. But I
digress. There’s nothin’ worse than
going out in public in a dress; I mean, what if someone saw me? Then at church ya got all these old ladies
coming up to ya, saying how pretty and cute you look, and all ya want to do is
crawl in a hole. Eventually, I fought
enough that I didn’t have to go to church anymore. It was a hard won battle.
Then puberty hit. HOO BOY!
You know the story: menstruation,
my breasts bursting forth and destroying the smooth, beautiful landscape of my
chest. Stealing my
carefree days. I cried the first
time my mom yelled at me to come inside and put a shirt on.
All of the sudden it
wasn’t ok for me to wear baggy, ripped up jeans and a t-shirt to school
anymore. Everyone picked on me and
called me names. So I tried to fit in
this mold that was prepared for me. I
tried to play the part, tried to be Girl.
Well, lemme tell ya, I failed miserably.
I never really was a good actor, anyway.
So I came out as a butch dyke. THAT I was good at. I
was smooth and cute, and ALWAYS a gentleman.
I still got picked on a bunch by the boys, but a lot of the girls
thought I was good-looking, fun to be with, and I treated them much better than
their boyfriends. And they flirted with
me. I liked that.
I stumbled across this
movie when I was in high school, called “Boys Don’t Cry.” It was about the life and death of Brandon
Teena, this kid out in
My revelation brought
with it a whole lot of new questions.
What does this mean? What can I
do about it? How will this affect my
mom? I spent hours an’ hours readin’
books and searching on-line for people like me.
I researched my options. When I
was a kid, I was always dreamin’ of having a beard and hard muscles. And then I find out that that’s
possible. All ya gotta do is take the
male hormone, testosterone.
It’s not as easy as
that, though. I had to really think things
through. I wanted to make sure this is
what I really wanted. I mean some of the
changes are irreversible, so ya gotta be sure.
For several years, I went back and forth on the issue. One day I really wanted “T”, another day I
wasn’t so sure. Anyway, once you’re
sure, ya gotta go see a shrink, which I hate doing. But I did it anyway. I went to this shrink for six months so that
she could decide that I was ‘mentally sound and fit enough to make a
life-changing decision of this magnitude.’
Pissed me off that I had to go to a ‘normally’ gendered person and pay
her lots o’ money to TELL ME that I can decide to change MY body the way I need
to in order to feel comfortable. Thanks
a bunch! I couldn’t have figured that
out without ya, Doc. Never saw one of
them supermodels get shrunk in order to get a boob job. It’s a messed up world, I tell ya.
So I finally got my doc
to write a letter of recommendation- sounds like I’m applyin’ to a job, or
somethin’- so I can bring it to another doctor- a physician this time. He’s gotta run a bunch of blood test and such
to make sure that my body isn’t gonna react badly to the testosterone. I hate needles, but I understand the necessity
of this procedure for my safety and well-being.
When my results came back in, my doctor wrote me a prescription for
testosterone.
It’s been almos’ ten
years since the day I injected the first shot of my new life into my
thigh. For ten years, I’ve saved up my
money to complete the final phase of making my body my own. That’s why I’m here in this grey waiting
room. I’m ready to have the surgery to
remove my breasts and masculinize my chest.
It’s been long overdue. I tell
ya, these babies have given me trouble in my time. I always gotta strap ‘em down when I go out
in public, ‘cause I know what happens to ya when you step outta the gender
box. Ya end up dead like Brandon Teena,
Marsha Johnson, Robert Eads, or Tyra Hunter.
People don’t like us grey people who don’t fit neatly into a male or
female box.
I never was a woman. See, I never expected to transition this far
and pass fully as male, either. I wanted
to live on the fringe and be somewhere in between male and female, where I was
content. But the world just won’t let ya
do things like that. I guess things just
don’t always go the way you expect ‘em to.
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