The movies, TV series, video games and books that always made a big impact on me were the ones where the protagonist starts out as an observer. Comfortably on the sidelines, they watch as the struggle ensues. Sure, they’re on the side of the folks on the losing side of the struggle — usually the ones who have the moral high ground — but in their minds the struggle itself, and the community that comes with it, aren’t for them. They don’t belong. They have other, more pressing things to deal with that are right in front of them, and need their immediate attention. They’re too busy dealing with life’s day to day problems, to feel like the struggle is theirs to fight. I think of Humphrey Bogart’s Rick from Casablanca, cold and dispassionate. Comfortable in being as far away from responsibility, or direct action as one could possibly be.
When I first read the Facebook post, I strained my eyes to read and reread the alphabet soup of letters at the bottom. LGBTQ2IA+ welcome. I’d seen those letters many, many times before. I thought I’d known what they all symbolized, meant, and stood for. But for most of my life, I didn’t think any of that was anything I could take for myself. For the various Bisexual, Asexual, and Gay friends in my orbit, I thought none of it belonged to me, because I was the Ally. The straight, cis-gendered, sexually heteronormative man cheering on my friends from the sidelines. I was comfortable. Their fight wasn’t mine, but I could at least give all of the support, positivity, and friendship I could: giving a friendly and sympathetic ear when it was needed, boldly calling out people on social media…and somewhat less-boldly calling out people in my day-to-day life. “A” of course, stood for Asexual — people like my childhood friend, or my work friend. But for me, the Ally, that wasn’t my “A” to use. I was somewhere else, not on the battle line of letters and identities. But that was almost what seemed like a lifetime ago, even though it was barely more than a year. Now, reading that post, that “A” had shifted into something else for me. It was something that I could now take for myself. The event page said, LGBTQ2IA+ welcome. So I was welcome. I could be welcome.
I often think of Rick these days, from the movie Casablanca. In his story, a call for help sets into motion the gears that shifts his frame of perception from observer to participant. Up until now, I’d never thought of the moment in my life that kickstarted my journey from Ally to the Asexuality spectrum and Demisexuality as a response to an outside cry for help from someone else. After all, it was something I did, not just something that was done to me. But in digging deeper, I wonder if there was really something in me that was crying for help, ignored, and wilfully forgotten by the rest of my consciousness. What I do know for certain is like Rick, when that signal for help finally cried out, I couldn’t just ignore it. I couldn’t ignore those parts of myself that I’d dismissed as unimportant any longer. I’d have to listen to the questions they’d ask me, and the answers I’d have to give.
I must have been nervous all day, so much so that the day’s worth of teaching class all became a blur. My usual, borderline crippling anxieties about my job — about my students liking me, about my bosses liking me, about my friends liking me — all of that faded into background noise as I thought about the event. It was like the thoughts of the Facebook post, with its coming event at 7 pm, had flipped my North American TV brain to Channel 1.
Queer Board Gaming Night. Safe Space. All Trans Identities Welcome. LGBTQ2IA+ Welcome.
Exiting the subway station and walking to “The Village”, I tried in vain to reassure myself that going to this event was the right thing to do. I identify on the Asexual Spectrum. The “A” stands for Asexual. The “A” is part of “LGBTQ2IA+”. The post said “LGBTQ2IA+ welcome”. So I would have to be welcome. So I would belong. So I shouldn’t have anything to worry about. This chain of logic became my mantra for five minutes, lines of reasoning looking and feeling as frayed as the ends of the sleeves of my coat.
When the ushers at the restaurant brought me up to the tables on the second floor reserved by the board gaming group, I’d realized I was early. Still in my oxford shirt, tie, dress pants, shined boots and long black coat, my mind panicked as the others started streaming in, all smiles and greetings. My attire surely had placed a gigantic sign above my head, heralding me as being the most normatively, cis-genered, heterosexual person in the room. My eyes scanned everyone coming in for as long as I could before they’d raise any alarm bells. How did they look? What external traits did they have to signify they belonged, which I didn’t have? Nothing in the way I was dressed could ever communicate how I came to be here in this space: failed relationships, and broken promises, and an aimless year spent wandering into cafes, reading and journalling in the desperate hope that I couldn’t be as broken and evil as I’d thought I was. The only thing it could ever possibly communicate was how I’d avoided coming out to myself: by pretending that everything was normal, and everything was just fine. Especially when it wasn’t.
The two people who were clearly in charge of things came together in a corner of the room, one looking like they’d biked all the way here from some improbably far corner of the city, and the other looking like a polished author at a reading. Behind them stood stacks upon stacks of board games and card games I’d never seen before, with titles more befitting the latest Hollywood blockbuster movie or AAA console game than anything made of ink and cardboard. They raised their hands in welcome and took a quick scan of the room. I looked around me, at what they were looking at. This had to be a room of some of the most honest, most beautiful people I’d ever seen in my life. “Thank you all for coming out tonight!” one of them chirped brightly. “First, since there’s a lot of new faces, I’d like you to introduce yourself with your name, something interesting about yourself, and your pronouns…”
I barely remember the rest of the evening. There was an incorrect use of “she”, followed by an apology lagged by a stabbing flash of guilt, which evaporated with the nonchalance of the assumed offended party’s, “Oh, thank you. No problem.” I was introduced to the deductive board game Concept — and all of my anxieties quieted amidst collective roars of laughter and group-wide sighs of confusion, punctuated by orders for more fried food and alcohol.
And then I found myself on the grey platform of the subway station, its walls enveloping me in tiles of sickly blue-green. I was typing furiously on my Messenger app, relaying the day’s events to my best friend living in Thailand. An out Bisexual woman, her experiences surely gave her the insight to recognize the emotions swirling in my head, in a way that I couldn’t.
“So how did it go?”, she asked.
“It went well, but, it was…weird. It was hard. Everyone there was nice to me and all, no one rejected me or anything, I was included as much as I’d expect to be as a newcomer, but…I couldn’t shake this feeling like I didn’t belong. Like I didn’t look like I should have been there. I felt like an interloper.”
“Uh huh.”
“It just felt so weird. Again, it wasn’t anything anyone said. But it felt like I wasn’t…Queer enough…to be there. I don’t think I looked like I should have been there. Like I was taking up Queer space that should have gone to someone else. Like someone else should have been there, not me. But I’m glad I went. I would have regretted it if I didn’t go.”
“Yup.”
“Am I making sense? Have you felt this way before?”
And that’s when I could visualize her standing right there on the platform, looking at me. Her glasses and shirt cast in the unmistakable tri-hued glow of Bisexual lighting. She gives me a welcoming smile, tempered with commiseration that pull on the corners of her mouth. At that moment we both share the validation of being seen, of being accepted, and being doubtful.
“Yup. Welcome to my world.”
We start going down the subway platform together, everything turning to soft and grainy black and white. My steps are in sync with the fresh resolve of someone new to the fight. That distinctive music swells. Walking side by side with her, I say the first thing that comes to my mind with a sense of new belonging as a Demisexual, and as someone finding themselves in their Asexuality. It feels like I’m saying it not directly to her, but to everyone at that board gaming night. To the greater Queer community.
“I think this is the beginning of a beautful friendship.”
