by Stefan James Drew
Sitting here outside with the crisp air hitting my face. Tears running down my face as I reminisce about when life was simpler, an old irrational thought comes to visit me like a ghost saying I should end my life in a cliffhanger. Semicolon tattoos dance before my eyes like a seductive trance. It consists of a period on top but a comma on the bottom. I ended my life but it was paused when I was resurrected back to life. My mind screams out, “God why am I trapped in this slavery of depression and freedom!” Got my shackles off my ankles, legs weak, but I’m trapped in my cell with the keys of freedom out of my reach. I look out my mind’s eye and I observe the people’s nomadic prison aimlessly in their heads not knowing the keys are in their hands. I choose my freedom partially.
Out the penitentiary but in the throng running into walls looking for freedom keys from each other when their keys are in their hands. I just unlocked mine but I won’t lift my slavery from my mind. Slavery tells me who I am. What I do and why I stay put. People want to know what it is like to be me. How I use jokes and sarcasm to hide the fear and pain that’s inside my eyes. The sleepless nights from waking up from the daily trauma I suppress inside. The lack of energy and motivation to keep going cause the weight of my depression and my self-identity feels like I’m moving a couch up the stairs to a room, but my hands keep slipping from the weight and the angle that is resting on me. And it is on the daily. Let me paint you a small taste of my life to walk a mile in my shoes. It is a daily struggle to wake up and continually defend my truth which is I AM TRANS! I wake up. I sigh and walk to the mirror and have to mentally and physically sound like a male (FTM) since I’m not “passable” yet. I speak low. Aim my voice to the ground to sound like a tenor bass man. Fix my hair and attach little pieces of my hairy legs to my face. I glance at the mirror. I like what I see but what questions will be asked of me to why I put on this face THEY see.
So I grab the razor, and the memory of my dead dad dances in my eye. “Now, before you place the razor on your face, you wanna wet it and add the shaving cream. God, how I miss you. I look ridiculous, and I shamefully cut the hair off. Baby face Stefan. What I long for is to have my dad’s genes and to have his curly thin facial hairs. I kiss my fiancee goodbye as she heads to work. I eat breakfast. I go to the fridge and grab my vile of insulin. I draw 35 units; stab it into my stomach, and inject. The slight rush of adrenaline and pain hits the spot. I breathe and count to 10 before I open my eyes and take it out. I dress myself and head to my job. I arrive at my job and put on a brave face. I work in retail (Dollar Tree). I face the stares when a man calls me a lady and I correct him (as a matter of fact), I absorb all the laughs from college guys and teens when I proudly correct them on my pronouns and they point out my breasts. The only small victory I have is when the sweet old ladies call me sir when I help them to the door. I even apply my bass to my voice like I pass, and it’s no use to the mothers who shield their kids from me like I am a pedophile. And the dads who beam with Pride when their sons whisper to them if I am a guy or a girl. And we won’t even get on the subject of me being Black either. That is for a whole different conversation for a different time.
So, then I clock out from work. I come home to my family. I prepare to not have my deep bass. Instead I change to my “regular voice” and release the stomach muscles I held in to look flat chested all day to see my small bulge. Look in the rear view to see tears well up in my brown eyes and I wipe them to try to hide the evidence of crying on the way home. I have a fiancee who is white and my step son who is white. They ask me how my day was and I lie. I say it is great (my fiancee knows better than to push, but she sees right through my tears).
I finish my dinner and again, inject another 35 units of insulin into my body. My fiancee pulls me into a kiss and a hug. She smells like Dairy Queen. Oh how a Blizzard sounds right about now. Wait. We can’t dwell. My goal is T. My ugly foreign chest is top surgery to remove them, and with my high numbers of diabetes in my system, I will not get any of those things cause I’m not healthy enough. The thought of the sacrifice brings me bittersweet release. My focus goes back to my step son. My step son tells me some trick he learned on GTA V on his Xbox. I play a couple of rounds of Black Ops with my girl while absent mindedly wondering what it’s like to be a cis-male for a moment. Then it’s time for my shower. I shower all my tears of frustration, anguish, and anger and unacceptance of the day down the drain. I scrub my skin with soap to the point it turns red wondering why I feel unloved and unaccepted like a cis-male/female who people easily accept. I get dressed for bed. Tell my fiancee all of my struggles of the day as I lay my head on my pillow. I begin to dream about what it is like to be a cis-male, one who is white living in America, who only sees me the way they want to see me.