Tuesday, November 27, 2018

The Location

This past week was the week of Thanksgiving. I think I gained five pounds in the culinary wasteland that is this period of time. Regardless, I enjoyed being home on Cape Cod with my family. I took this opportunity to go back to a location that's special to me. This is the place that I went to fifth and sixth grade. It had the very short and easy to articulate acronym of BHMCPS. Which, of course, stood for Barnstable Horace Mann Charter Public School. Since I studied there, they have changed the name to BUES or Barnstable United Elementary School. Probably for the best.
Middle school was an awkward time for me. I was the kid that everyone wanted to copy homework answers off of. I was also the kid that had friends in every social circle, not fitting into any one specifically. I was also a girl who dressed exclusively in men's clothes and had short hair. Some teachers had the audacity to ask me if I liked "girls" or "boys" better. Or if I wished that I was a boy. These questions always made me extremely uncomfortable and I never answered them. My gender expression became an oddity that even adults felt necessary to challenge.
This field and track was the first place where I was able to experiment with different pronouns and a male identity. I joined an after school lacrosse team where I was the only girl. All of the other kids on it were older and didn't know who I was. I was frequently read as male as a child, so naturally that's how they categorized me. Every practice they would address me with "he/him/his" pronouns and call me "Billy" (which my birth name sounds remarkably close to). I never corrected them because I felt so at home. This is why I'm choosing to recreate this location in "Bound." It was the first place where a repressed identity was validated and I engaged in physical activity.

No comments:

Post a Comment