#slowdissolve

I have legit been holding on to this just because it makes me smile 😊

By Tumblr user slowdissolve

My name’s Ann, I’m almost 48, and I live in a small town in the Midwest USA. I’ve been married 18 years, have two teenage children, and I’m bisexual.

I grew up in a small, religious, traditional area. I don’t say conservative, because it was the 1970’s, and I went to a tiny Catholic school run by the Sisters of St. Francis, which was and is a pretty progressive group of women. I seriously considered the convent for myself for many years.

The 1980’s arrived when I was in junior high, and the AIDS crisis was beginning as I entered high school. People did not come out. It was simply a thing one did not do. Gay people were the butt of jokes and lived in cities. I knew that I was different: I dressed in a butchy way, cut my hair short, didn’t wear makeup. I didn’t date, mostly because the small dating pool of boys was put off by my physical appearance (though fat wasn’t necessarily a deal breaker) and my intellect (which was). I had no clue if any of the other girls I knew at the time were attracted to other girls. They showed no sign of interest in me.

I had the good fortune to go to an Ivy League school. Yale was known in the League as the “gay Ivy”, and it was a transformative and positive experience. I met openly gay men for the first time. I don’t quite know why I didn’t meet any lesbians, but that may be because they were already paired off before I got a chance to meet them. I came out to my friends there as queer in my senior year, and it was very positive. By that time I’d realized that I’d been having crushes on other women. But at that point it might have been just a bit too late.

The most prominently out group on campus was gay men, and most gay content came from them. The AIDS crisis was an enormous factor in this visibility, and their writing and artwork was often sad, frightened, or militant because of this. The social climate of the outside world had not yet changed to be accepting.

What lesbian content I’d been exposed to was pornography created for a male gaze. It did not appeal to me. I was put off by it; I was out, but not comfortable being out anywhere but at school, and when I graduated, I went back in the closet. I knew that it was not a choice to be gay, but since I was bisexual I could still pass for straight and attempt a relationship with men after I graduated. I believed I could suppress my attractions.

In the few years between college and meeting my husband, the Internet did not have the reach it has today, and I simply didn’t know where to find other women like me. Finally I got internet access, and that’s where I met my husband. We are still happily married.

Being attracted to and married to a person of another gender didn’t end my attraction to my own gender. I hid those feelings and that part of my identity. I did tell my husband I was bi, but I’ve kept my marriage promise.

Seventeen years later, in 2016, I was sick of Facebook, and I decided to open a tumblr account because a college friend had been part of its creation. I had no idea what I’d find there.

Suddenly I was exposed to a deluge of artwork and fiction and meta discussion about all the things that interested me. My kids and I had very much enjoyed the Avatar: The Last Airbender and Avatar: Legend of Korra series, and I was surprised and pleased when I heard in the news that the lead character, Korra, was canon bisexual. So when I joined tumblr and found an entire community of people who enjoyed it so much they created new fan-driven content for it, I was at once delighted, enthralled, and at home.

I realized very quickly that much of the content was adult-themed; but though technically pornographic, it bore little resemblance to the videos I’d seen throughout my life. It had a completely different quality, because it had been created for and by women attracted to other women. It was gentler, sweeter, more affectionate. It was still very much sexual content, but it did not objectify women in the way that I had always seen before. It was incredibly easy to identify with the characters, and positively, and the fan works explored literature and artistic themes with queer characters where one would typically find straight characters.

My eyes were opened. Having married a man, I knew little about what my life might have been like if I’d been born 20 years later. Now I understood what I’d missed. It’s a great regret; a deep sadness that I can’t change, through no one’s fault.

At the same time, now I could enjoy things with a much more genuine feeling of fulfillment and identify much more closely with characters. I made friends in the fandom. They’re all younger than me, but sometimes I’m a mother they never had. I found nonbinary and trans kids and learned about their issues in a way I’d never known. I learned and learned and learned.

I found other fandoms, as well, and heard about movies and shows that I would never thought to watch before. All touched me in a way I never felt before.

I started creating art of my own. I’d received a degree in art 25 years before; now I was finally using it and making things I enjoyed and was deeply proud of. I had FUN making this art, which had been too rare an experience otherwise. My skills as an artist continue to improve as a result.

Recently, I started writing fan fiction. Taking two older characters from The Legend of Korra, I believe I have found a niche. I am able to write and draw women much like myself in age and temperament, with a perspective unlike that of younger writers. I’ve allowed myself to feel emotions in those characters that I have been unable to feel in my own life because of my circumstances. And I’ve received some wonderful praise for what I’ve written, and that is the most amazing feeling. To make believable something that I’ve never experienced personally is astonishing.

I can’t understate the importance of fan works to my acceptance of myself as a bisexual woman, even though I have come to that acceptance later in my life. I hope the content that I’ve created will be found by women like me, a little older, a little late to the game. And I hope it makes them feel as much better about themselves as it has made me.

This essay was submitted to the @aroomoftheirown​ project, a blog and zine that seeks document the myriad of ways in which LGBT content creators and fandom participants use fanworks as a celebration of their identities and to force popular mainstream media to reflect their lived experiences by collecting essays, comics, and interviews documenting how LGBT members of fandom use their various talents to carve out a space for themselves in mainstream fiction and to explore their identities in a relatively safe space.

The blog that will accept submissions on a consistent basis and the eventual goal is to compile a selection of the pieces into a zine or a series of zines, the proceeds of which will go to the Trevor Project and Trans Lifeline

hey, if you need a mom-like friend, let me know

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