Night & Day

Today, I had a wonderful day. Long and tiring and also stressful because I’m still having car issues — but my buddies have my back, even with my car issues. 

I finally climbed again with my closest climbing buddy and had a nice afternoon with him — and the climbing session itself was a great ego-boost for me. While keeping it easy and not overdoing things since we’re both coming back from injuries, I was actually able to lead half a dozen routs at the gym, keeping my anxiety due to the second chorus rehearsal tonight in check and focusing on the climbing, almost channeling that anxiety, and finding and expressing my own masculinity with more confidence again. 

Rehearsal was wonderful. It was still difficult at the beginning, I still felt super shy and a little anxious despite my “Big Sibling” being there. But he seems really nice and he brought me a little gift (dark chocolate and pistachios, things I had mentioned that I liked in my intake form), which was really sweet — what a huge difference small things like that can make! It also helped that as I entered the venue I ran into the artistic director with whom I have some familiarity and trust and when he asked how I had felt after last week’s rehearsal, I told him honestly that I had been in pieces and he was genuinely concerned and supportive. I still felt awkward and somehow different during the potluck but it wasn’t as uncomfortable as last week. And I still struggled with the singing at the beginning, but not nearly as much as last week. People introduced themselves to me and many of them asked how I was feeling, how the music felt, and most of them said, “Welcome! We’re so glad you’re here”. I felt much more welcomed, or welcomed in a warmer sense this time. And I felt much less that I didn’t belong — I actually almost felt that I belonged. I was addressed as “man” and “boy” a couple of times, which felt very affirming and validating, and today I didn’t once feel like a “woman” or “girl” nor the weight of my AFAB past. Part of it was the affirmations I got from the outside (e.g. being addressed as “man” and “boy”) but part of it was also my own increased confidence in my own (version of) masculinity, which maybe also came form the inclusive climbing event I organized/led on Tuesday and the climbing session with my buddy earlier today. 

And above all, I was able to sing!!! It was still a little hard during warm-ups, partly also because I ended up sitting next to a man with a booming voice that either drowned my own voice even to myself or made me feel like my voice was “not male enough”. But after the break, we rearranged and, whether my voice had warmed up by then or having other guys at my sides made the difference, it worked: I was able to actually sing, to sing loud, almost confidently, and — mostly importantly — enjoy it. I wanted it to never stop. I enjoyed myself so much that I almost stayed, I almost thought about joining the guys who went to have food&drinks across the street after rehearsal — maybe next time. 

I can still see and feel many differences between myself and many of the cis gay men: but tonight these differences hardly weighed on me and they didn’t stop me from singing or from being able to enjoy myself.

Tonight, I found my voice and let it out. And I felt wholly like a boy — my own version of boy with my own, beautiful, version of “male voice”.