reading room
A Practical Guide to My Pronouns
Shall they say he? Well, yes, they shall, and I'll twitch like a smoke alarm catching whiffs of burnt toast, but not burst into flames.
Shall they say she? That one feels like wearing shoes two sizes off: tight in the toes, loose in the heel, clumsy to walk in, but walkable.
Shall they say they? Fine, though I can hear the grammar police loading their rifles in the distance.
Shall they instead recite the full inventory: citizen, taxpayer, carbon-based biped, entity formerly known as male, until language itself is exhausted.
It's like asking for bread and being offered gluten-free, yeast-free, air-fried, paleo-adjacent flat circles of despair— when all I wanted was bread.
And what of my girlfriend? Must she introduce me as boyfriend, partner, "significant other," or the individual currently under contract to hold her hand at parties? For heaven's sake, just let us be!
And no— I do not wander into boy's changing rooms, pretending I belong there. Some lines I won't cross. Some spaces are too heavy with other people's certainty, too sharp with stares to make my small compromises worth it.
Avoidance is its own form of survival.
Because here is the truth: it isn't the words themselves, sharp little stones in my boot, that trouble me most. It's the smile that says I'm humouring you, the silence that says you're not real, the pause that says why can't you just pick one?
Language is a tool, sometimes a cage, sometimes a joke stretched too long, but always a mirror polished by whoever holds it. I could demand every reflection match me exactly— but then I'd become the archivist of labels, dusting shelves no one reads while the world keeps moving.
So call me he, and I'll wince, but keep walking. Call me she, and I'll sigh, but not collapse. Call me they, and I'll nod at your effort, though English would rather split its own infinitives than loosen its grip on gender.
Because I am not here to drill obedience into your tongue. I am here to live, to speak, to matter. And if I must choose between a life where words are pristine and a life where words are messy but mine, I'll take the twinge, the pinch, the occasional semantic glitch.
Because I know the surface can bruise me, but the depths— the depths decide everything.
— Lilith