My 87 year old mother-in-law did her best to 'out' me today. In a way it is a bizarre form of acceptance. She is always putting females in the family down, but she never tries this sort of stunt with the males. I should know after 25 years....
and since I am full time I never present as male any more.
Anyway we were out for lunch in an English country pub and she bumped into an old neighbour of hers that she did not know too well. She and I sat down early because she is not steady on her feet so she needed to sit and I sat with her. I had never met the neighbour before so I introduced myself simply as "Beverley" and the pair of them had a chat for a minute of two.
Then my mother-in-law decided to introduce me
"This is my son-in-law, he has changed a bit" and the poor woman looked over at me, completely confused. I smiled back at her. Then my mother-in-law said to me
"What's that disease you have? It has three words in it". I just ignored her again and gave the other women a rueful smile and a shake of my head. Then one of my other relatives popped over and said
"Beverley, what would you like to drink?" so I ordered my drink and the poor neighbour looked even more confused because I looked female, she thought I was female, this other person asking me for a drink was calling me by a female name, I have a passable female voice and here was her old neighbour saying I was a son-in-law. Then she made her mind up and mouthed the words
"She's getting old" referring to my mother-in-law. I nodded in agreement.
She stayed for another few minutes and I kept my serenity through the whole thing. To be honest I was not remotely bothered by it. I knew she was playing power games, attempting to put me down by embarrassing me. Well, it did not work and she noticed it. Later in the day I received more snide comments which I also disregarded. Before I left to come home, mother-in-law apologised to me which meant that I had won.
I have spent years watching her try these techniques on her daughters and it always annoyed me. She never, ever tried them on her son or her sons-in-law of which I was one. Now I was getting snide remarks just like the girls in the family.
So for me, it was a double victory. She may not have consciously realised that she has accepted me as female, but her sub-conscience has me all sorted out.
