How to be an enby on vacation, or: I don’t feel like correcting everyone I meet for two weeks
(photo by me, Nov 4, 2018. Me, a non-binary person, wearing glasses and a cardigan, smiling at the camera.)
I’ve mentioned before, and definitely on my personal tumblr, about being non-binary. Even though my 30s are coming to an end, I’m grateful to have discovered the various beauties of the gender spectrum over the past five-ish years. When I was younger, I thought perhaps I was a trans man, because being a girl just didn’t feel right to me. I rebelled against all things labeled feminine, telling myself that just because I had boobs didn’t mean I was required to wear dresses. I felt wrong in my skin but couldn’t figure out why.
It’s actually in part due to tumblr that I have been able to come out as genderqueer non-binary. Seeing other enbies being cuties or just living their lives, I was then able to let myself reclaim some of the things I’d previously discarded, and to start bringing dresses and other “girly” things back into my wardrobe (because fuck pants). Identity and presentation are not the same things, and I can be an enby without needing to appear androgynous all the time.
But then that leads to a lot of emotional effort on vacation. I’m presenting mostly femme, waring leggings, tee shirts, and cardigans. It is a decidedly comfortable outfit for train travel, but leads to me being met with “young woman”, “lady”, “ma'am”, and “miss” all during my trip. The attendants mean well, but it’s a larger symptom of a society that doesn’t recognize that not everyone fits neatly into boxes labeled male or female.
So the question becomes: do I take precious time away from my vacation to educate people who may or may not be receptive? or do I allow myself to be misgendered the entire two weeks I’m away? So far I’ve chosen the path of least resistance, and have not corrected those who’ve used she/her pronouns for me, even though my pronouns are they/them. Especially with the non-native English speakers I’ve dined with; I’m not sure how to describe non-binary genders with the limited amounts of French and German I know. Even if I think it will be no issue, it’s not my job to use my relax time to educate others. What I can do instead, is educate where I can, for example, my teammates at work, those in my therapy groups, friends and acquaintances in my social circles. Or even blog posts such as this one. I might be preaching to the choir, but it’s tumblr that educated me; it may be tumblr that helps educate someone else.
