I saw "I Saw The TV Glow" twice. The first time was a shitty camrip with fucking like. Sports betting ads every twenty minutes. I watched it in the dark of my bedroom, my eyes glued to the screen. I knew it was about being trans, and I knew it was by the same person who made We're All Going to the World's Fair (another film I saw and loved), and I knew there was a fucking Yeule cover of a Broken Social Scene song in it (genuinely amazing gets all around), but not much else. I didn't know who was trans, though I hoped hoped hoped beyond all belief that Brigette Lundy Paine's character would be. I had loved them in Atypical (despite that shows numerous flaws) and was like, hell yeah, an actual nonbinary person playing a trans character. I had no idea about Owen until about twenty or so minutes in, and then ----- oof.

The second time I watched it, I downloaded a copy in 4k, no betting ads. I watched it in that same spot in my bedroom, and let the details I missed in the fuzzy camrip wash over me. I watched all the way through, and the last scenes hit me hard.

I am trans. I am not out. I am whatever the transmasc equivalent of a boymoder is (girlmoder???). It's easy, and also so hard. I want to be called by a different name, but I haven't been able to pick one yet. I want to be percieved as a guy, or even as just something other than a girl, but I know that won't happen naturally. My goal is to girlmode until I'm able to get top surgery, but that is at minimum two years away, maybe longer given my intermittant doctors appointments. But I can feel it wearing on me, and the longer I go without making a choice one way or another, the worse I can feel it getting.

The problem of it is; I don't want to feel like people are humouring me. And I know they will be, for the first while at least. I look like a girl. I sound like a girl. So it's almost more like. Humiliating to ask them to treat me differently. If I change my name and customers at work wrinkle their nose and go "huh, that's an odd name for a girl", if my coworkers correct someone on my pronouns ---- I don't want it to be a thing. Mostly at work, but at every other intersection of my life as well. I don't want to be a Thing, you know? I want to be... me.

I know it's killing me, but I think I can manage for two years. But then, if it gets to be longer... I have no concept of how I'd manage that. So I think I'll have to come out before then. We'll see, I guess.