Taking off my clothes for strangers: part one
Beginning of a trans art model
I sat in a chair, wearing nothing but a bathrobe and slippers, staring at the toenails on my right foot. I had meant to repaint them, but forgot. Half of the polish was flaked off. Here I was, a woman with a penis, about to expose myself to a group of strangers for the first time in my life, and all I could think about was how bad my toenails look. The teacher finished his lecture and let me know that it was time for me to start. I walked over to the platform in the middle of the room.
There is a moment that comes when you have to do something scary. In this moment, the fear of looking foolish and backing out crashes into the fear of looking foolish and going forward, and it slams into the body. Like running full speed into a wall, you either break through or bounce off. The adrenaline spiked for only an intense instant. I slid my robe down and set it on the stool. My feet came out of the slippers. I stepped onto the raised platform, which had been covered with a sheet I brought from home.
“Did the students already know that I am trans?”
“Are they surprised? Shocked? Disappointed? Horrified!?”
I can’t look up. I can’t see if they react, how they react.
To avoid seeing the looks that might be crossing their faces, I look down, right at my horribly painted toenails. I sigh. The stage is almost always in the center of the room with people surrounding it in a full circle. Warm up poses are short. I just have to remember to rotate a little bit with every pose so that each student sees the human form from many different directions, so a few students do not have to stare at my rear end the entire time. I was on my third pose before I remembered to rotate.
Reason:
Now I have to answer the question why. Why did I put myself on that stage? Nobody forced me to it. I sought out the job of art model.
I will not hide. I will not be ashamed. For most of my life I disliked the person I saw in the mirror. I did not understand the way that person was supposed to act. The face brought me endless pain in the form of expectations I did not know how to meet. In the beginning I ran and hid from the truth. I tried to make myself be something that I was not. So much of that life was pain. I wanted to bury it, with all of the shame and fear that it entailed, and hide who I was. I have come to realize I cannot love the person I am, and hate the journey that brought me to this point. Likewise, I cannot love my body, while I hate parts of it. In time those parts may change, but at this moment, I must find peace with them as they are.
I can say that one part of my body does not define me, and by stepping onto that stage, I fully embody that statement with my heart and soul. When I hear the students and teacher discussing their sketches, using “she” and “her”, they give power to the truth of that statement. Within myself and, I hope, within them, this active performance weakens the internalized transmisogyny that weakens us individually and collectively. When not on the platform, I can hold up my head while I talk to them. Maybe they will realize that I am not a freak, weirdo, or punchline. If I can get them to see it then maybe I can see it too. I do it to prove to myself that I am not ashamed.
One word or two:
I can only speak for myself. Each person’s relationship with these words will be different, and those relationships are as relevant and valid as mine. If I seem to be defining them, then know that these definitions are mine and may not be true for other people.
Am I a trans woman or a transwoman? In the first one, trans is an adjective, which can be dropped when not needed to clarify. It describes but does not define. The second version is a whole new noun. It defines the person in such a way that they cannot be simply a woman, which is why some people take offense to this one. It creates a separate category for people that can be extremely painful for a person when they have spent much of their life wanting to belong. I could go on to ask when or if there is a time when both stop being valid on my journey, but that is beyond the scope of this article.
Seeing something and hearing it are not the same thing. If I meet someone, am passing, and choose to let them know that I am trans, then they may think that they understand, but in a way it will not have a sense of finality to it. As the saying goes, seeing is believing. For those whom I choose to tell, I feel I am trans woman. When I am on that platform, I am transwoman. This highlights the questions already asked. Why would I choose to do this? Why do I separate myself from the peace and comfort of anonymity?
Purpose:
Normal does not exist in a static form. What is normal changes from place to place and time to time. In the past, many atrocities were allowed to continue with the argument that they were normal.Today, in the here and now, trans is all too often not viewed as normal. By separating us from the idea of normalcy, we are othered, marginalized, and colonized. Lots of things are okay if done to an “other”. Hating, fearing, and beating can be justified if it is done to those things that live outside the normal. Any horrible attribute can be given to those things because they live outside of what is understood. When a scapegoat or punchline is needed, then some convenient other is used.This in turn reinforces the outside status of this other thing. I say thing because when something is on the outside, it is perceived to lack the essential humanity that is inherent in those that are on the inside.When a group is othered, their humanity is minimized and they are politically and socially erased.
How does something become normal? For me, the answer has been exposure. When I started this journey, multiple people told me that I was their first exposure to a trans person. Over time I began to understand how I was changing the way that they viewed the world simply by being in their lives. This changed me and how I wanted to live. I decided that instead of hiding, I would use visibility as a form of protest and resistance. Every person must first and foremost look after their own health and wellbeing. For some that means that they hide. Once I realized I could be visible, once I realized that I could do this, I felt that I must.
When I started talking about art modeling, I kept hearing people say that they could never do that. Once I realized that I could, I felt that I must. My hope and my goal is that I might in some small way normalize the trans body, at least for these students. I can remove from it the novelty, mystery, and hopefully the fear. It may not change the world, but if it helps even a few to see the world in a better light, than it is worth it.
After:
After the last pose I went into the back room and changed back into my street clothes. I waved goodbye to the instructor and, realizing that I had some time before my own class, went to get a cup of coffee. By the time I had filled my coffee cup, I was starting to get shaky. I was crashing from the adrenaline I had not realized was running through my system. Halfway through class I realized I had not heard a word that the professor had said. At least being in class would count for attendance. It was the first but not the last time I would be on that platform. Some experiences were better than others. I am happy that I chose to do this job and grateful for the trans activists that brought us to the point where I could do this. For some students I am possibly their first art model, and for others I may be their last. One thing was made very clear. If I want to be the woman, trans woman, transwoman I want to be, I need to take care of my toenails.
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