I met an androgynous person at summer camp. This was long before “they/them” and so she was a she. A girl who went to girls’ summer camp and just cleaned house among a free and willing culture of budding women. I was desperately attracted to her. Mom saw my excitement when I came home from camp. She said, “Kiah is finally encountering androgyny!” And the truth was that I had to ask her what the word meant. Like so many women who came before, this young lady was deprived a space to be herself.

Step back probably nine years to the time I had short hair and a boy on the playground with blonde locks to his waist asked me if I was a boy or a girl. I vividly remember looking at his tangle of hair just freely caught on itself and all over his shirt like so many brambles in the woods. I said, “Are you a girl or a boy?” knowing full well that no girl’s long hair would ever be so messy. He was offended and ran off. I had won.

Not long after that, maybe two years, I trailed too far behind my mom entering the women’s room. Instead of cruising in after her as I intended, I received a tongue lashing from a stranger for going into the wrong restroom. This woman tore me apart–was probably having a bad day/life to begin with–even though I tried to tell her I was a girl. I remember my mom coming out of the bathroom to find me inconsolable. I remember her looking for that woman. I can’t remember if they spoke. I do remember holding my pee until we got home.

When I was much younger my pops taught me to play ball. I played t-ball and little league happily among the boys’ teams for several years. When I started to grow boobs, somebody noticed and sent me to softball. They separated me from my friends. It was a different game and all the girls were already cliquey. They were surprised when I faked an injury and sat out the rest of the season. I never played on a team again.

Fast forward to this past year, when cutting off my curls became terrifying somehow, right up until I did it. Pause right now then, and see me serving up androgyny like nobody’s fucking business. I’ve become the person of my dreams.

I have spent much time examining my female-ness. My chosen pronouns. How I feel about “womanhood”. I am absolutely genderqueer/nonbinary/gendernonconforming.

I do not want to adopt “they/them” mostly because I don’t like the way it sounds. I also don’t want to give up my sisterhood, not ever. More than anything though, I think the conversation about gender is already growing old. I appreciate my “they/them” pals for staying strong and queer. I respect everyone’s pronoun choices.

Here’s the thing, y’all: all of this is just a really beautiful, honest and human attempt to clean up a landfill-worthy pile of garbage built on policies made by people who are either dead (byeee) or might as well be. Their time is done and they are squealing like the stuck pigs that they are.

We are still here.

We have always been here.

I am eager for the time when this conversation is irrelevant, obsolete. I hope to live to see it. Someday we will know again, as our ancestors did: human is human is worthy. Everyone, every one.