We are so preoccupied with labels and boxes that we forget about the individual behind the tag.
Who are we really?
I am a mother, who has never given birth. A sibling to nine other people, yet I’m my parents’ only child. I’m a supermarket worker with the soul of a poet. I am a wife, ex-wife, fiancée, and ex-girlfriend. I am these disparate things, all at the same time.
I have long, black hair, can cook like I’m getting paid to do it, and have a toolbox and power tools that most men would give their left testicle for. I’ve dated much more men than women, but I will never date another man or woman again, because I’ve found my soul mate.
So label me!
Do we really need to fit inside a little box so badly, that we deny the other side of who we are, and who we can be? Are we caricatures of ourselves? Do we secretly hate the burden of non-conformity foisted on us by society yet publicly revel in it? Have we accepted our own choices? I can only answer these questions from one perspective: mine. I won’t presume that I can answer on behalf of the LBGTI community.
We need to identify as a group. That much is certain. We need the political clout, that is only found in large numbers, in order to ensure that the generations that come after us, are not discriminated or reviled, as those were who have gone before.
But does being gay mean we are all the same? How often do I hear that “we gay people” all do this or that, from within our own ranks? Do we still think of ourselves as “queer” in the literal sense of the word?
I’m more than the sum of my parts, as all of us are. I am conflicted, ironic, sarcastic and downright difficult. I am a woman, who loves women, but who certainly doesn’t understand the female of the species any more than a man does.
I’m just me and comfortable in my own skin. I remain slightly jaded, yet still optimistic.
So if you meet me on a crowded beach someday, and you want to ask me about myself, ask away. Depending on my frame of mind… you’ll hear what I’m feeling that moment. I don’t like to label what I refuse to define. But hey, you meet just meet a friend for life.
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