More Than a 'Boy Who Paints His Nails'
Just a Queer and their favorite coffeeshop. 3/21/16
There are numerous complexities and intricate phenomena in this universe.
The chemical composition of our solar system’s bedrock - the sun - for example, is roughly 70% hydrogen, a vital element found in all living beings. It is estimated that due to the process of blinking about 28,800 times a day, we spend 10% of our waking hours with our eyelids closed. Or how the pigment of Brown irises makes up more than half the human population, while Blue eyes are less than 10% of the population.
The core of someone’s personhood is innately more multiplex than a distinctive deduction to gender normality. The gorgeously idiosyncratic, yet unified, patterns of our cosmos have led me to believe two things; we know nothing, and that is ok. It is not beneficial to possess knowledge, unless you continue acknowledging its paramount importance throughout your life journey. One who reads a book, but does not question the writer, does not feed their ponderings with ‘whys’ and ‘hows’, has wasted the necessary components to learning, and in turn, living.
We are questioning beings. We know we do not know, and this fact allows us to be creative beings. We must allow ourselves to construct our own unique paradigms regarding the functionality of our own personhood. For this very reason, I am more than ‘just a boy who paints his nails’.
As a human being, I am more expressively comfortable having my fingernails painted. The exterior of my core includes scarves, long hair, and the color purple. As one could imagine, I receive quite a few gawking stares from the general public. But, the fact of the matter is I am not a placeholder whose exterior is interchangeable, nor are you. I can’t just take my nail polish off to be more masculine, or wear less feminine clothing - merely because that would not be who I am. The exterior should always reflect the interior of a person. Striving for this alignment of order is terrifying and can even be dangerous in our world today. The word ‘privilege’ is used quite often these days, as it finally should be, and the lack of privilege is being forced to live a life where you are not allowed to live with an alignment of your interior and exterior - without facing some form of persecution. The exterior is now a prescribed normality within the social construct of humanity, and invalidates any form of interior or exterior being which contradicts our status quo. I pray that in my lifetime, the world will finally respect the alignment of interior and exterior personhood, to allow for a healthier and more embracing humanity.
I identify as genderqueer. I feel a responsibility, and necessary expression to validate both energies which occupy my soul’s core. The intertwinement of masculine and feminine energy not only fulfill my sense of self, but they also allow me to cultivate a greater introspection of who I am as a uniquely crafted creature of carbon and hydrogen. In every metaphysical and physical sense, we are the essence of the very patterns of galactic, diversified order. Then why can’t we acknowledge the beauty of beings who are more complex than the norm wants them to be?
The fulfillment of humanness is only obtained through death, and by then your legacy becomes who you were, but never who you are. Your present is only a construct of specific time and place, meaning you are always changing, and the only part of you which is consistent is your mental vessel. Sadly, we all to often seem to fear this fact, instead of embracing the fleeting intricacies of life and identity.
In reality, like all of us, I do not know who I truly am - nor will I ever. But, I can say with conviction that I am more than ‘just a boy who paints his nails’.
I am an ever changing, growing work of woven, artistic mastery, and so are you.
- a.j.k. o'donnell 3.21.16