Acting In and Coming Out

I didn't act out. I acted in. And in and in and in. No wonder I was drawn to matryoshka dolls -- always looking for the self inside the self inside the self, until the time came when the container split open and all the selves came spilling out, revealing the truth of who I had always been.

I didn't act out. I acted in. And in and in and in. To the observer, the naked eye, I was: Pretty, petite, responsible, accomplished, talented, expressive, unique, and sweet. Inside, I was lonely, unknown and unreachable, unheard, muted, longing, multitudinous, dark, intense, sad, and tough.

I didn't act out. I didn't skip school or tell anyone to fuck right off. I didn't have a curfew because I didn't need one - I'd be home by 10 anyway. I acted in. I smoked out the bedroom window, binged and purged after whole days of barely eating, and turned my homework in on time.

I didn't act out. I acted in. I hung out with guys four, five, six, eight years older than me, who had no business having a girl my age in their car, in their apartment, in their bed. I asked questions in my journal that only once or twice saw the light of day and were eclipsed immediately by lack of models or a voice.

I didn't act out, until it was too late, until I'd spent enough years taking the heads off the dolls, lining them up by height, writing and writing and writing and writing, hiding and hiding and hiding and lying and crouching behind sheds and dumpsters and between cars in parking lots and in the alleyways between businesses where I could be anonymous, where I could stop smiling, where I could be no one and only then feel like a person.

I didn't act out, until I acted out so badly it would take years to accept the messiness of my own human explosion, inevitable after a lifetime of swallowing my voice, fire in the belly, a cunt like a river, language like this forbidden, what if you mother is reading, what if you father is reading, what if your boss is reading, what if your kids are reading. We don't talk like that, we don't act like that, we don't dress like that, we don't put our own needs on the table like so many cards, exposed for the world to see who we really are.

The inside and outside, first in an uneasy communion, little by little blending into something like wholeness, something like moon and sun, something like complete acceptance of what was and what is, something like deserving happiness, something like going back and collecting those tiny dolls and telling them they were always just right, something like telling the girl who held the family together that it was never her job, never my job, that self-appointed role of harmony-maker who sang her dissent to the impervious sky.

Be brave, I told other people. You're beautiful, I told other people. I see you, I told other people. You get to have a voice, I told other people. And eventually, the littlest one crept out and climbed into my lap and I stroked her soft curls and told her I loved her and always would.

Coming out can be terrifying and emerging can be painful when what you're used to is confinement. Take your time. If you're not safe or need someone to listen, reach out. Find your people. Practice looking in the mirror and saying lovey-dovey things that feel embarrassing until one day they don't. Notice where you buoy others but withhold that same fierce encouragement from yourself. Let it be a practice, every single day, for as long as it takes even if that's forever.

Act in, act out.

Breathe in, breathe out.

All of me is allowed. All of you is allowed. And all of us, together? That's pride.