The Invisible Man is Seen

Something cool happened this weekend.  It was accidental, but still cool.  Someone saw me.  Someone saw me and identified me and that person had a microphone so everyone could hear her seeing me.  Why is that such a big deal?  Because most of the time, I’m invisible.

“Hi, I’m Kyle, the invisible man.”

Oh, and I should clarify, this is Kyle, not Casey.  I don’t usually do the writing here because Casey gets to the keyboard first — ok, to be fair, she’s usually the one who has something to say and can figure out how to say it.  But today it’s my turn, because a stranger saw me.  Well, I’m not always invisible, because Roxy sees me, she has from the beginning.  Somehow it’s different when it happens out in the open, with strangers.

The location was the Stonewall Youth Gayla fundraising event on Saturday.  There were lots of butches and genderqueers and trans people of all ages there, it was pretty cool.  I chatted with some new friends who know me through the Pizza Klatch organization.  Anyhow, toward the end of the event, the MC was getting people to bid an amount they could contribute monthly to Stonewall Youth, as a way for them to have income they could expect and budget for.  My wife and I decided what amount we could contribute and then I waited for the MC to call out that level.  When she did I raised my hand and I was the first person she identified for the auction helpers…

“Yes! The man in the glasses at table 9.”

Wow.. if you’d been listenin’ to my heart at that moment, you might have called 911.  I just smiled and nodded, but my wife said something like, “Uh, not a man…. ”  under her breath.

I smiled at her, too, but didn’t say anything to correct the MC’s assumption, because I was thinking, wow.. she saw me.   I know why my wife protested.  She’s very fierce and protective and at various points in our life, Casey has protested being called a man, so she was just getting our back.

Except I didn’t want to be defended.  I didn’t want the MC to take it back.  Even if she only said that because the lighting was low and I was sitting down and she couldn’t see our boobs, I don’t care.  It felt good to be seen, even accidentally.

Most of the time, I’m invisible.  I’m wrapped in a woman’s body, though a pretty masculine one, still usually seen as a woman.   Clerks and cashiers and waiters say ‘ma’am’ or ‘Ms. Jones’, very rarely ‘Sir’.

Most of the time, I’m invisible, but for a little while, in a very public and queer setting, I was visible.  I was seen as a man.

I was seen.  For a brief, shining moment, I was very publicly not invisible.

…

To honor the occasion, I’m including the memo I recorded talking about it.

Kyle_is_seen (audio)

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