Inaugural Scene

And I am drawn back into a memory of my mother. We are in the communal shower at an old YMCA gymnasium. I have just gotten out of the pool and run into the shower to wash the smelly chlorine off of my body. My mother tells me to take off my suit and rinse it out. I am embarrassed to remove my dripping wet suit, although no one else is in the shower with us. I do not like to be naked. Ever. But the water is running warm from the old rusting faucet, and so I shimmy out of the tight Lycra with the pink and purple butterfly pattern tossing them to the grimy tile floor.

My mother is also showering, completely naked and I am staring at her, fascinated by her female body, ashamed at my lack. I look to the spot between her legs and I wonder when my own “down there” will grow together like my mother’s? I look “down there” and imagine that one day it will no longer have an opening allowing things to penetrate, but that maturity will seal it shut and it will be grown over with light brown curly hairs. My down there is so open, raw, and exposed and I am ashamed that anyone who walks in will see the openness that my “down there” invites. I figure I need to touch it as long as I can because one day it will be contained and I won’t be able to access it anymore. I cannot wait for the day that mine will close, no longer available for the world’s consumption.

As I turn around I am faced with the incredible repulsion of an erection that is simultaneously present and absent. A bulge in her pants where one should not be. It appears to be dragging her pelvis across the stage towards a woman in a short plaid skirt, high white stockings, and heels. She is so alluring, tall, with short brown hair, a tight white shirt pulling across her breasts. I am drawn to this woman, although I do not desire her sexually, I desire more fully to identify with her. I have high hopes for the reclamation of my femme lesbian gender identity as something beautiful, subversive, and resistant.

Yet, I am dismayed by the erection, standing pointedly, attentively, not caring about the feminine woman’s needs for pleasure. This erection is self-interested wanting only to penetrate the “down there” of the feminine performer. Her back is turned as the protrusion moves closer and closer. A sanctioned performance of queer sexuality is taking place in front of me; yet I am disgusted by its vulgar demonstration of oppressive force. While the erection is most likely a representation of a sock in the plaid shorts of this drag king’s pants, it has very real material consequences for those of us witnessing it drive the entirety of the performance.