what it says on the tin, pal. I've wanted to write about this for a while now, and I finally got around to doing it. anyway, i truly do love being a teenage girl, not in the sarcastic way. like, im thankful for who i am right now. i love being stupid with my friends and giggling over dumb shit and having crushes and being dramatic and being feminine and also not being feminine. ik this might sound like a "lol who cares" thing but gott damnit I care!!! anyway this matters to me because when i was very young, like 4-5 years old or smth i was very, like, stereotypical little girl. i liked princess dresses and i liked pink and i liked flash dressup games and shit like that. and i was real happy n shit, god i was just fuckin around and watching flash cartoons n shit it was nice. anyway i dont remember exactly when, but eventually i kind of hated being girly, i wanted to be.. oh god i cant even say it..... "not like other girls" who liked dolls and horses and shit like that. i think it was around when i was 6. anyway i didn't actively think it but i definetly hated being a girl back then and i wanted to be Not Like That. i would be like "yea my favorite color is black and i play pokemon unlike other girls and i hate dresses and i hate haing cute hair", shit like that, and i built up a reputation of being the "tomboy", becaue to be seen as feminine in any way was the worst thing ever for me. And here's where I write the essay about how afab people are told from birth that they're "frivolous, dramatic, talk too much, stupid" shit like that by the media around us, and how women who are obviously feminine, as in, hair makeup dresses nails shit like that, are always portrayed as "mean, dumb, drama queens" and girls who weren't like that, who had more "masculine" interests were considered cool and funny and shit like that. So like, i would associate traditionally feminine hobbies as being bad. But anyway, that's an essay thats been said millions of times before. point is, i didn't want to be like "other girls". and so like I said, i built up this reputation of being all "like one of teh boys XDD LOLOL". BUT DEEP DOWN, i still wanted to wear cute dresses and play with dolls, i just never did because i internalized this hatred of anything "girly"; the idea of being "girly" was engraved in my psyche as being a bad thing, so i could never enjoy traditionally feminine things because that was BAD!!!! and so everyone, even my family, knew me as "le ebin cool tomboy".
Anyway i was like this for some years, where i hated being feminine. And now is the part where i say that im aware that objectively, things like wearing dresses and dolls arent't feminine, as in, they have no objective "gender", the idea that certain things are feminine and others masculine is entirely subjective, but when everyone agrees that is "is" or "isn't", then the border of subjectivity and objectivity is like, less clear. Gender doesn't exist but it also does. Anyway, i didn't like being what people viewed as "feminine" because i was led to believe it was a bad thing. and here's the part where i know what i say will sound dorky, but who give a shit. it was around this time i got into touhou, where it was all girls and they all wore cute dresses and were feminine..... and omg they were cool?!?!? touhou definetly helped me realize that being feminine isn't a bad thing, because there's all these girls that are obviously feminine but they're also smart and cool and funny and nice, and like, omg i wanted to be like them?!?! and i also got into sewing, because when you can sew, you can make anything you want, and goddamnit i wanted to make cute dolls. and it was ALSO around this time where i began to learn that being a girl is a choice, like i really didn't have to be a girl if i really didnt want to. but deep down, i really did want to be a girl. so i made the concious choice to be one. and i realized that the way to show the world what i enjoy and what i like is to "bee urself!!!!11 XDDD". like i know it sounds dorky, but really, when you learn that you can express yourself in any way regardless of gender, its very freeing. because really, im only here for a while, might as well enjoy it. i can enjoy feminine things and be thought of as a "silly teenage girl", but like, yeah thats who i am. like, you think of a stereotypical silly teenage girl giggling on the phone with her friend, writing in her diary, having crushes on people, being dramatic, like yeah thats me. finding happiness n shit.
so anyway i guess my point is that sometimes you fit into a stereotype because thats just who you are, and who you enjoy to be. and yea, as long as you arent a real dick hurtin other ppl, thers nothin wrong with that. and i mean, its not like i even fit the stereotype to a t. i'm still not like, super feminine or shit, bcuz the way i am right now is what i enjoy being. and i think i'm satisfied if i can find a balance between "i want to be feminine" and "i would rather be less feminine", which is where i am rn. like i said, gender isn't really real, but like, it is. if boys want 2 wear cute dresses n makeup n shit that great bcuz it helps like... gender-neutralize those objects that have no objective gender. and if like, a teenager whos not afab is like, "god damn i want to be a silly teenage girl", then they have like, the power to transition and become the silly teenage girl, and they can wear the cute dresses and makeup and still be a silly teenage girl because like, they have their own view on what "feminine" is, and if that view is "stereotypical", who gives a shit, because like, this whole goddamn essay was about how its okay to be like that. enjoyee enjoyee enjoyee your life is what im tryna say here. enjoy what you want to!!!!!!