From: [email protected]
Subject: Nurse Jones; Freak at last, freak at last...
Date: 14 Nov 92 01:09:32 GMT
From Nurse Jones,
Someone called me a dyke last month. I almost reconsidered whether it
was wise to continue trying to get back to the Net. I don't like being
treated like a freak. Not that lesbians are freaks, it's just that I
was *treated* like a freak. Maybe I am one. But in reestablishing my
contacts here I have made myself vulnerable again to assholes like the
... person ... that called me a dyke. Not to mention the possibility
of losing my job.
A dyke. I guess there has to be a first time for everything.
Before I start, I want to say something: this is not a surprise. I
know I've been way too sloppy about keeping my private life private.
It has cost me several times. So don't go saying you told me so. And
don't go sending me any "welcome to the wonderful world of reality" e-
mail, either.
Besides, I'm not a dyke.
I'm a perfectly normal heterosexual most of the time. Say, 80%.
Anyway, I could tell you a tale of frat boy mentality that would
probably send the Shining Armor Brigade on a straight-bashing spree.
But I won't. You all walk the walk. You don't need to hear my puny
little story.
My first reason for poking these keys today is to ask if anyone knows
the basis for a self-destructive tendency that I suspect I share with
a number of you.
Call it the Coming Out Urge, for lack of, er, imagination.
Certainly not for lack of urges.
I was approached in the fitness center a while ago by an ASB lurker
who had recognized me somehow. He knew about ASB and had connected me
to my pseudonym -- maybe from clues he read in my posts about my
shenanigans while working out. You would not have been proud of me: I
panicked and ran. I should have played it cool and bluffed my way out
by pretending not to know what he was talking about. As it is, I had
to find another place to work out. I'll miss it, too; I had worked
myself up to part-time aerobics instructor and got free use of the
facilities.
I don't even know the guy and he could probably out me if he were the
type.
The point is, I have this urge to come out, and I leave clues around
for people like him to find. And then I panic when they find them. All
my experience tells me that coming out would be self destructive in
the extreme, given my job, knowing my boss, and keeping in mind the
fact that I live in the South. I'd probably end up running the donut
glazing machine at the Krispy- Kreme. Like someone I know who came out
and lost a good job. You can probably tell we went to a gay/lesbian
gathering recently. We met a bunch of people who have paid a high
price for coming out. I really just went out of curiosity. That other
20% of me was interested. Jay went, too. Talk about being the odd
couple.
I would probably end up a cashier in a Hoggly Woggly. Or worse: a
Piggly Wiggly. Selling on comission at Carpet World. Miniature golf
caddy. The possibilities are limitless. Basically, I'm not qualified
for anything *but* nursing.
As it is, I feel isolated from most of the people around me because I
know how they would react to my sex life. I've heard them talk about
it in other contexts and I know what would happen if a hyperbaptist
got ahold of me. I'd either be "saved" or burned at the stake. And I
feel resentful because I feel I shouldn't have to conceal my sex life
from anyone in order to keep my job.
So, paranoid as I am, I still have an unfortunate tendency to drop
bread crumbs that would enable people to track me back to my sexual
abode and find me if they had their antennae out and knew what they
were looking for. It's almost an involuntary thing. I think I must
drop these hints unconsciously because I want to be open about what I
do. And I'm paranoid because I can't be open without giving up a lot.
I have to *force* myself to be logical and protect myself even when I
don't want to.
Almost every time someone has found me it has been a disaster.
I'm sure many of the veteran ASB'ers have been through this. Some
lurkers are going through it now, I imagine. Do you find yourself
*trying* to come out despite the fact that you know it would be self
destructive? Despite the fact that you would get treated like a freak?
Called dyke?
I don't mean *wanting* to come out. I mean *trying* to come out.
Which brings me to the second reason for poking these keys today. I
saw a bird get hit by a car on my way to work this morning. It broke
it's wing. And that reminded me of some other freaks I know.
I mean besides Neets. Although I should probably mention her, too. She
feels like a freak sometimes. Because if her anorgasmia. It seems to
her that everyone around her is treating her as though she were
special, and she hates that. She keeps insisting that it's no big
deal. She hates it when attention is focused on her because of it.
Maybe freak is too strong a word. But she doesn't like to be made to
feel different.
Jay and I know a couple (from our days in Chicago) that has to deal
with the problem of being different in a very public way. Call them
"John" and "Mary." She has cerebral palsy. Not bad, but just enough
that you can tell something isn't quite right. Her gait is affected a
little, and the way she holds her hands sometimes reveals her to be
slightly spastic. In repose she is physically beautiful though;
slender, blonde, fragile ... and very fortunate to be untouched
mentally by CP. Not that she's brilliant or witty or anything -- she's
actually quite ordinary. They have a child, perfect in every way. John
is unexceptional in appearance but very kind and attentive to her, and
they both feel very lucky to have each other.
They don't know about our sexual lifestyle. In fact, we got to know
them before WE knew about our sexual lifestyle. They'd probably be
horrified if they knew.
Anyway, I have talked with them about dealing with the CP, the inlaws,
friends, etc. "Mary" once commented to me that a lot of people that
don't know anything about CP ask if she was "that way" when they got
married.
They ask the question in a lot of subtle ways, but they are curious,
and they find ways to ask, and the question has some nasty
implications. Her reading is that they want to know if John is a saint
who stuck by her when this problem appeared or if he's a weirdo who
married her because of it. I was there once when the question was
asked and saw them look at each other. A little light goes out in her
eyes. His, too.
She says her father is no better: he's very protective and still
hasn't learned to trust her husband. He's suspicious of John's motives
in marrying her.
And John hasn't helped matters much. He gets (understandably) a little
pissed that people would gossip and speculate about his motives, the
nature of his affection; he's done a lot of soul searching and he is
sometimes a little too brutal in his honesty.
When her father asked John how he felt about her CP -- a legitimate
question for a father to ask, I guess -- he told him that most things
about their relationship are more important than her disability, but
he also made it very clear that he loves her because of the way she
is, not in spite of it. Would he love her more if she could
miraculously be made perfect? No. But it would change their
relationship and he hopes he wouldn't love her less.
I've heard some thoughtless people say that a girl as beautiful as
Mary wouldn't look twice at a a nondescript guy like John if she
didn't have a disability. And I've heard them wonder why he took a
chance with his genetic future by marrying her. What she has to offer
... what he gets from the relationship. Dark, unkind speculation. They
can't just take it at face value.
I asked her how she felt -- not so much about other people, but about
John. She says John needs to take care of a bird with a broken wing.
She understands that is part of why he wanted to marry her, and she
feels lucky to have found someone like that. She's convinced he feels
lucky, too. She believes him when he says he wouldn't want to change
anything about her. Of course he would "cure" her if he could, but
they both believe their relationship might lose something if that were
to happen. If we're honest here, he might never have been attracted to
her if she hadn't had CP. Is that so terrible? Does it have to be a
symptom of something? Can't it just be? Does it have to make them both
freaks? If you get to know them, you realize they're not. My sexual
behaviour makes me more of a freak than either of them.
Sexual behaviour aside: in my own small way, I have a similar problem.
I have inverted nipples. Jay says this is a genuine case where I have
the option of considering them a "bug or a feature." He says they're a
feature.
But a few bad experiences with men made me feel a bit like a freak
when I was younger. It took Jay a long time to convince me that he
really does love them as they are, that he wouldn't want to change
them, and even if they were easy to fix surgically without risking
loss of function and sensitivity, he PREFERS them as they are. He even
says that if I had normal nipples and it were his choice, he would
prefer them as they are.
But I'm sure there are people that would think that is weird. They
think that Jay should want me to be perfect, or at least that he
should love me less rather than more because of this defect. Feature.
Or in spite of it. Certainly not because of it. They really make me
mad. I guess that's why I feel such a kinship with "John" and "Mary".
We really have very little in common with them for any other reason.
Imagine a woman with beautiful feet married to someone with a foot
fetish. Marriage made in heaven? But she might wonder: if he didn't
have this quirk, would he even care about me? Is our relationship
based on a psychological quirk rather than real affection and love? I
guess that would be a pretty shallow foundation for a relationship. Is
it any more shallow than loving someone for beautiful eyes or a tight
little ass?
Jay says my nipples were part of my initial attraction, and that our
relationship is well beyond that stage, even if they were a major
factor in our getting together -- which they weren't. In fact, they
almost kept us apart, I'm so defensive about them.
I guess we're talking about initial attraction, here, which may always
be shallow. I don't know. Maybe there's a fear that an initial
attraction based on a fetish may be abnormal and therefore never
develop beyond the fetish stage.
But what if it was abnormal? What if it continued to be important to
the relationship?
What if it were important to John to have a bird with a broken wing?
Does that mean broken birds should go uncared for?
So anyway:
This morning the car in front of me hit a bird with it's windshield.
It was a red-headed woodpecker. I don't know what kind, except it had
a red head and black feathers.
The poor thing flopped up into the air and plopped down on the yellow
line between the lanes of traffic. As my car neared it it fluttered a
couple of times and discovered it's wings were broken.
I know I'm reading more into this than the bird was feeling, and a
bird is just a bird, but I caught a glimpse of it after it tried to
fly and couldn't. It was a beautiful morning. Clear and mild, blue
skies...
It lifted up it's head and looked around at the woods on the far side
of the road, the perfect sky, all out of reach, and then it bowed it's
head; the point of it's beak touched the road surface. Then I was past
it.
Birds, after all, have bird brains. I can't ascribe deep emotions to
the damn thing. It's just that there was such sudden resignation in
the gesture. The bird slumped. I could see recognition of the
immensity of it's loss in that bowed head.
All this in just the space of just the few seconds between me and the
car in front.
It must have been a half mile before I got into the right lane and
pulled over. I never found it. I wasn't sure exactly where it had
been, even. Or what I would have done had I found it. The only other
hurt bird I tried to help ended up frantic and pecking at me. Some
birds just don't want help, no matter what.
Like Neets. She's a broken bird, too, I guess, but she'd blow her top
if she heard me say so. She hates it when we are careful of her
feelings because of her anorgasmia. She thinks we are treating it as
though it were a disease. She gets impatient and says it's no big
deal. Forget about it. Leave me alone. She doesn't like being singled
out any more than anyone else. So after a while it becomes natural to
ignore it. Sometimes her frustration rears it's head anyway.
I don't know what the point is. I just think of all the broken birds
that are never found and saved. Why would anyone *want* to label
someone else as a freak?
Fortunately, my ego isn't as fragile as that woodpecker's wing. When
fratboy called me a dyke I told him that actually I was bisexual, but
that he shouldn't feel threatened because he didn't meet either of my
standards. But if it makes you feel more comfortable, I said, my
husband tied me to the bedposts this morning and screwed the daylights
out of me.
"Just think," said
Nurse Jones,
"... that was four
hours ago and
my sperm count
is probably *still*
higher than yours."
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