sitting at jen’s house, i stared at her yearbook, watching memories of my own high school years flash through my mental vision. i knew nothing of these kids, except for what they presentd in the yearbook, yet i could see who did not belong and why. most of the kids looked related – their clothes and attitude resemebled one another. these were the kids whose faces appeared under titles like “best looking” and “most likely to succeed.” their faces appeared again, under captions of sports teams or school activities. they all looked the same – fresh eyed and ready to party.

these kids did not interest me. i was far more interested in tracking down those were not comfortable in all-american high school. they were easy to spot – their faces looked worn and the expressed anger and frustration in their quotes. it had been a hard four years and these kids were ready to leave, to get out of the hell hole that trapped their growth because they did not belong.

one picture took me in a special way. a young man in a leather jacket, without a smile, hunched over his body, looking tired. under his picture, the caption declared all that his image had already said. he was sick of fighting and being an outcast. as i stared at this picture, i mentally teased with the idea that this young boy was transgendered. his name did not help eliminate this question – alex.

later, at jen’s party, i overheard a few girls discussing one female classmate’s desire to be a man. apparently, this erin appeared at the prom in a tuxedo and expressed her preference towards being considered a man. one girl talked about a run-in with erin where erin accused her of continuing femininity at their school and this young woman was like “duh, i am a woman.” it did not shock me to learn that erin’s preferred name was alex.

and then it struck me. how horrible it must be to grow up in a community like this as a transgendered individual. this was all-american high school, complete with binaries of masculine/feminine, male/female, jock/nerd, cool/dork. at least when you fit into the binaries constructed in high school, you have people like you at your side. as a transgendered individual, that could not be. the loneliness that prevails must drive a young person insane. it saddened me to realize that this must have been hell for alex and i longed to reach out to him and tell him that it was going to be all right in the end.

floods of aweful high school memories flashed through my brain. remembering barry, a wonderful young man who knew he was gay at an early age and took shit each day for it because the culture could not allow that. remembering the young woman whose names was purely associated with “lezzie” to a point where she learned to live up to their expectation and stalk classmates. remembering jesse’s butch dykeness and very quiet crush on the straight femmes in the school and how she could not ever share this, although everyone saw it in her. remembering the eco-crowd who was always presumed to flourish in bisexuality and became objects of disgust for most of the people in our class. just differing sexuality made high school hell. image being differently gendered…

who created peer pressure and why does this prejudice have to exist at such a young age? it makes me cringe to realize that this is life for most people who are different in any way. how i wish that i could fight and give different kids a chance of survival. but i barely scraped by, with a few lies and the recognition that if i survived high school, i would have the opportunity to leave. how can i help when i have been an utter coward all of these years? but i long to do so, without an understanding of how.