Pronoun Problems: A Novel About Friendship, Transgender and (eventually) Ninjas

45 - Man's True Best Friend

The following morning, I came out of the closet, too.

Although in this in this instance it was a literal one. I was bare-chested, my hair damp from my recent shower, and carrying two T-shirts on plastic hangers. Samantha, whose waking-up process usually took a good half hour or more, was still in bed, propped up by pillows, scrolling through the news headlines on her iPad.

"Which one do you think I should wear?" I asked. Just because our relationship had become painfully strained didn't mean that I didn't continue to consult Samantha on my fashion choices. I held up both hangers to give her a basis for comparison. On the left, my classic Pink Floyd Dark Side Of The Moon T-shirt with its iconic prism, on the right my classic Pink Floyd The Wall T-shirt with its iconic screaming face. Both were outstanding choices and I simply could not decide between them.

Samantha didn't bother to look up from her iPad. "Isn't today the day that Tom — excuse me, Tamara — is going to the office dressed as a woman for the very first time?"

"Good point," I conceded and smiled at my own foolishness. Tom would be showing up at DuckGoose in a dress. Nobody was going to give a shit about my stupid T-shirts.

Although for the record, I went off the board and wore my classic Pink Floyd Wish You Were Here T-shirt with its iconic fiery handshake.

(I figured you wanted to know.)

But it was interesting going into work and being a fly on the wall, watching the reactions as Tammy walked by in a coral ruffled silk blouse and denim culottes — a word I am sure I had never heard in my life until that day — trying not to seem self-conscious under the appraising gazes of her coworkers. As I suppose I should have anticipated there was a pronounced gender split in their assessments.

The men were supportive — bless their hearts — offering smiles, thumbs up and the occasional generic compliment. But it was clear to me that they were also a little freaked out. Which I knew from the looks on their faces and, also, because throughout the day, I would be approached by them, one at a time, all asking variations of the same question:

Am I a bad person for thinking this is really fucking weird?

They weren't being mean-spirited; they were just trying to make sense of it — not just what Tom had gone through, but why it bothered them — and as someone who had spent months wrestling with these very questions, I was the closest thing they had to an expert. And I won't lie: After so many months keeping my mouth shut, I welcomed the opportunity to pontificate.

First, I reassured them that they weren't bad people. (Even if they were bad people, which some of them decidedly were, this didn't seem like the time to start a fight.) "I went through the same thing," I'd explain, "but after a while, it seemed perfectly normal." The use of the past tense was a bit of a lie, actually. Yes, much of the time it did seem reasonably normal-ish, but there were still plenty of times that it still seemed quite strange. For instance, Tammy's voice. It was no different than Tom's... until she got a phone call, at which point it would suddenly go up two octaves. I understood the reason: When she didn't pitch up her voice on the phone, people thought she was a man. But it was always jarring for me: One moment, a baritone. The next, Betty Boop.

As to the why of it all, I offered up my own overblown theories on homophobia, transphobia, fragile heterosexuality and toxic masculinity. I'm not sure any of it was valid, but at least I was finally getting some use out of my stupid psych major. But I also had another, simpler theory, based on my (admittedly statistically insignificant) discussions with men about why it was so upsetting.