Know me for myself
Someone wrote…
I transitioned at the beginning of this school year from male to female. Before this year, I was widely unknown, even though I was our school contrabassoonist, and I played the piano in one of our pieces in the highest band in my school, and I had many solos in our Philharmonic Orchestra. This year, more people know me than I know myself. They don’t talk about the fact that I’m arranging a piece for our holiday concert, that I’m composing pieces for both our band and our orchestra, or that I’m learning the harp; they talk about the fact that I’m transgendered. It’s mostly in a positive light, but I just want people to know me as the girl who loves playing and composing her music.
I want to be the music-lover, not the she-who-used-to-be-a-he.
What’s your experience?
Category: your voice One comment »
September 26th, 2012 at 10:35 pm |
Hooray for contrabassoon! I played boring ol’ regular bassoon =)
I don’t think many of these people “know” you. They merely know about you.
It’s funny / irritating / interesting / aggravating what others focus on, what they obsess over, and what they completely ignore. I elicit the same reactions, or at least I feel I do: “That’s wonderful artwork, but why is zie all different and interesting and … … …”
No, there is no “but why.” It’s wonderful work. Period. Unfortunately, that’s not the ‘novel’ part for them.
Many others will recognize that you’re ‘different,’ but for all the wrong reasons. I’m personally jealous of your musical breadth, but others will see the superficial aspects first. That can hardly be avoided. What could be avoided is *locking in* on those superficial aspects.
…Hmm, I didn’t mean for this to be a personal polemic. I guess I feel precisely what you’re feeling. We want to be recognized for our true creative work, not for our “creative” presentation.
[Reply]