Catching Up
It is only at times like this, the middle of school holidays, briefly, when any other responsibilities are shucked off, that I can properly reflect.
I'm fine, in the a kind of "No, it's really not worth discussing in a counselling session because I know what needs to be done and can't face it" sort of way. We're on holiday, for the eighteenth time, in Aberdyfi. It is as calming a break as it is possible to have: we know the journey, the people, the hotel, the experiences we are likely to have, the pleasures we can enjoy. It also serves as a timeline: this repeated event, a time of reflection, a much filmed, photographed and written-about handful of days each year. And, as I walk on the beach, as I have every year, I see all the other years, faint marks on the palimpsest. I'm grateful, mostly. For health, sanity, family, friendships, security. But there is sadness. Always sadness.
On another subject. I last wrote about my previous school; now I am entering my second year at a new school. I had told the head about my self, before I took the position. I told the deputy as well. I had to tell my immediate peers as it was affecting my work. And then, after a few fumbled conversations in which the head expressed his discomfort at me telling everyone, I made my own mind up.
On one staff training evening, I ran a five or ten minute show-and-tell. With the head's support. With the aid of tasteful PowerPoint slides showing myself in the Guardian article, as a child, as a young adult and then in my true, glorious selfhood, at Pride in 2010, I taught my respected peers, all of them, about my transgendered condition.
And it was good. Very little was said, either then or subsequently, but relationships became honest, more considerate, more relaxed. Just as I thought they would be.
I am reading 'Flaneuse - Women Walk the City', by Lauren Elkin. It resonates in so many ways. I have had to apologise to Lauren for my solipsistic blurts about the book because it does strike so many chords.
I have walked cities since I was fourteen or fifteen, in Paris. I walked throughout London from eighteen until - well, I still do. At first, and for many years, it was to lose myself. I would become so absorbed in the people and surroundings, and in my imaginative response to it all, that I would lose my sense of self. It was a relief from self-hating, from pretending to be who I wasn't.
Then, when I transitioned, it was as if all the lights had come on: I was centre stage, scrutinised, vulnerable. I had asserted my self in very public spaces and could no longer hide. It was exhilarating but also terrifying. Only after months and miles of walking did I find my self. The more confident I became within, the less I showed. I became less visible again, only this time I wasn't trying to lose myself. For a brief, brilliant time, I felt a unity with the city around me, whether in empty, nighttime streets around Soho and Westminster or standing for two hours in the midst of the human flood pouring through Borough Market.
Now I am entirely invisible again. I'm comfortable in myself but I no longer assert that self. Few will notice a fifty-something figure walking through London, except for the smile. I still smile at every face I notice, because...
I'm fine, in the a kind of "No, it's really not worth discussing in a counselling session because I know what needs to be done and can't face it" sort of way. We're on holiday, for the eighteenth time, in Aberdyfi. It is as calming a break as it is possible to have: we know the journey, the people, the hotel, the experiences we are likely to have, the pleasures we can enjoy. It also serves as a timeline: this repeated event, a time of reflection, a much filmed, photographed and written-about handful of days each year. And, as I walk on the beach, as I have every year, I see all the other years, faint marks on the palimpsest. I'm grateful, mostly. For health, sanity, family, friendships, security. But there is sadness. Always sadness.
On another subject. I last wrote about my previous school; now I am entering my second year at a new school. I had told the head about my self, before I took the position. I told the deputy as well. I had to tell my immediate peers as it was affecting my work. And then, after a few fumbled conversations in which the head expressed his discomfort at me telling everyone, I made my own mind up.
On one staff training evening, I ran a five or ten minute show-and-tell. With the head's support. With the aid of tasteful PowerPoint slides showing myself in the Guardian article, as a child, as a young adult and then in my true, glorious selfhood, at Pride in 2010, I taught my respected peers, all of them, about my transgendered condition.
And it was good. Very little was said, either then or subsequently, but relationships became honest, more considerate, more relaxed. Just as I thought they would be.
I am reading 'Flaneuse - Women Walk the City', by Lauren Elkin. It resonates in so many ways. I have had to apologise to Lauren for my solipsistic blurts about the book because it does strike so many chords.
I have walked cities since I was fourteen or fifteen, in Paris. I walked throughout London from eighteen until - well, I still do. At first, and for many years, it was to lose myself. I would become so absorbed in the people and surroundings, and in my imaginative response to it all, that I would lose my sense of self. It was a relief from self-hating, from pretending to be who I wasn't.
Then, when I transitioned, it was as if all the lights had come on: I was centre stage, scrutinised, vulnerable. I had asserted my self in very public spaces and could no longer hide. It was exhilarating but also terrifying. Only after months and miles of walking did I find my self. The more confident I became within, the less I showed. I became less visible again, only this time I wasn't trying to lose myself. For a brief, brilliant time, I felt a unity with the city around me, whether in empty, nighttime streets around Soho and Westminster or standing for two hours in the midst of the human flood pouring through Borough Market.
Now I am entirely invisible again. I'm comfortable in myself but I no longer assert that self. Few will notice a fifty-something figure walking through London, except for the smile. I still smile at every face I notice, because...