#(work in general)

[thylacinx]

Very close to lobotomising myself, but I would miss my cat too much

[bluebeetle-notafan]

Is it?

Is it so wrong to have a degree, only to consider working as a cashier, a shopkeeper, a front desk receptionist, a general clerk, etc.?

[saxigenouscorviform]

today an older lady i’m taking work classes with sits next to me

“i love your name!” she says, gesturing at my nametag

“haha, thanks!” i say. i get more excited now when people say they like my name.

“do you have siblings? what are their names?” she asks, and here i pause for a bit. my siblings have very normal, faintly biblical names. some of the people who are in this meeting are originally from the south, and i know i shouldn’t judge based on where people are from, i still do.

still, fuck it. i’m trying to be more honest with who i am. “uh, they have pretty normal names, actually; B_______ and B________. I, uh, actually chose my own name.”

She pauses, and i don’t know what she’s thinking (not that she’s unreadable, i just project my own fears. it’s weird how introducing yourself can be a stepping stone these days) “How did your parents feel about your changing your name?” she asks, and it’s fine. her voice is light, genuinely curious. no one queerbashes in seattle, not in a building with this many pyjamas and pets.

I laugh. “well, i think at some point, i made it pretty obvious that my name didn’t really fit me. they had to have picked up on it,” i say, thinking about how many times i pretended my name was aerynn or kazien or bremon, how often i’d rejected my name. how resentful i’d feel correcting its pronunciation to substitute teachers and strangers. “and when i changed it, i think they felt that, well, it was mine. i certainly went to enough trouble for it,” i add, thinking of 156 dollars, a court visit, and so many lines. So much paperwork. (i still haven’t sent the paperwork in to my old school to change it in their records).

(I don’t really know what my parents thought of it. i never asked. i tend to worry about Ruining Christmas too much - and what would I have done if they’d hated it? what would have happened?)

she smiles. “what was your name before you changed it?”

it’s simple curiosity, and i still pause. this conversation is filled with weird pauses, and they’re almost all on my end. still, she’s known me for two days by Moss, she’s not going to change it up now. 

in the end i tell her, wishing that one day my old name won’t have that feel of almost familiarity in my mouth, that i won’t have to write my name into phone scripts so i don’t accidentally say the wrong one. other people tell me it’s hard to get used to the name change - haha, i don’t say, imagine how it feels for me.

She looks at me carefully. “It doesn’t suit you at all. You look like a Moss, not a B________.”

I grin. “thank you. it’s much nicer being complimented on it now, too. I’ve done all the work this time.”