LGBTTQ* A Late Merry Queermas!
Merry Queermas from the Butch
It’s Christmas Eve and the family is together and I even get to meet dad’s new lady friend. I have been told that she is intelligent and was looking forward to a good conversation. She finally starts in on what I am taking. I see a spark of interest when I tell her that I am doing double honours major and how I will be taking the Sociology route for my masters.
She asks me what my area of interest is, and I feel a bit of heat rise to my face as I blurt out my answer. A confused look crosses her face, “Career studies?” she asks.
“No,” I had replied, “Queer, Queer studies and gender”. “Oh” she said dropping silent, the room following suit.
Even my grandparents were in the room right then, my Nana is sitting directly beside me, and I just dropped the Q word. Next came the awkward conversation change. I am glad that the dead silence shook me up enough to not look at anyone’s faces directly. I don’t think it would have been pretty.
Don’t get me wrong, I had already come out to everyone, but it’s the next step to actually have the family okay with this stuff coming up. They are use to the cover ups, used to me being vague once someone was touching base on reality. They would have realized how often it could have come up if I wasn’t avoiding the truth.
The usual questions are along the lines of “So what is your job?”, “How do you know them?” and “What is your topic of interest in sociology?” Each of these have the answers I gave to them, which could be considered true, and the straightforward answers, which tend to end the conversations.
My answers were, “Commissioner, they represent a group on campus on the student’s union board, much like how the women’s commissioner does.”(easy answer: LGBT Commissioner, i.e. Queer Commissioner), “I met them around”(easy answer: We both like girls..), and finally, “Uh..... Sexuality studies, and gender”(easy answer: Queer studies and gender).
A week ago I was explaining to dad how my sexuality will come up. He shook his head asking me why it would come up at all. I knew it would. Just last year I had changed my facebook status to “is, by the way, a bisexual, If you didn’t already know.” Honestly, it made me chuckle. I mean, everyone knew by now even my nana. So who was really left to tell? My sister then freaks out. I live three provinces away from them, but had come out to both my father and brother when I was about 14 during a yearly visit. Nine years later, my father and brother, for reasons that hurt to think about, did not tell my sister. I guess I have become the new family secret. My sexuality to be hushed, like that distant cousin’s pedophilia, or uncle Scott’s alcohol problem leading to auntie Jeans bruises. I sat back and simply answered her endless questions and declarations of shock at my bisexuality.
