About a month ago, I saw and retweeted this thread (ThreadReader link to the full thread) about femininity in the workplace.

And it got me thinking about how, for the most part, I still present to the world about the same as I did before I transitioned. i.e. jeans, nerdy tshirt, usually a hoodie, and no make-up at all. My hair is much longer than it used to be, and I have rather obvious boobs now, but for the most partā€¦ yeah. Not much has changed.

I tell myself that this is just my aesthetic, and not to worry about it. And because I also consider myself to be non-binary1, I kinda just lumped it in with that.

But then, a couple of weeks ago, I was in London with a friend of mine, and we happened across a Belgian shop which, among many other things, had a large selection of nail polish. It reminded me that Iā€™ve wanted to paint my nails basically forever, but never really got around to doing it. So I bought some. Specifically, I bought some in what was the closest approximation I could find to LucyPurple

But thenā€¦ they just sat in the bag, unopened.

I told myself that I just hadnā€™t got around to it yet, or that I didnā€™t have time, or that I needed extra tools 2. But these were just excuses I told myself.

This was looking like it was going to be a repeat of an idea I came up with after FOSDEM. In that case, every day of the long-weekend, I was almost exclusively in the company of awesome queer folk. So I let myself wear ever so slightly more feminine clothing (including an awesome trans-gopher shirt on the Saturday).

After I got back home3, I came up with the idea of a ā€œFemme Fridayā€, whereby Iā€™d let myself wear some of my more feminine clothes to work. The furthest that ever went was wearing a long plaid shirt on top of what I normally wore to work.

And then, a few days ago I saw and retweeted this:

And I think thatā€™s when it clicked in my head what was actually going on here, and itā€™s something which should not have been a surprise to me:

Iā€™m self-conscious.

They call me Captain Obvious, for saying obvious things

As much as I like to tell myself that I donā€™t care what other people think of me, it occurred to me that Iā€™m still scared to do much in public thatā€™s actively feminine.

On the far extreme of this, I have several skirts, which I desperately want to wear outside, or to work, but Iā€™m too scared to actually leave the house in.

But thatā€™s silly!

Iā€™ve been self-conscious about a great many things before, and Iā€™ve got over it!

I used to be terrified of using female toilets in public, but now itā€™s no big deal.

I used to be terrified of talking to my teamā€™s client at my previous job, but that became no big deal fairly quick.

I used to be terrified of public speaking (I still am, to an extent), and then I did a talk in front of about 200 people at FOSDEM, and it went okay, so now Iā€™m considering doing more of that kind of thing.

My point isā€¦ I do a thing which scares me, and then itā€™s fine.

So perhaps I should do more things that scare me?

So, long story short, I painted my nails last night.

It wasnā€™t perfect (I wasnā€™t expecting it to be), but it looks okay. And importantly, Iā€™ve come in to work and itā€™s no big deal.

I found myself hiding my nails on the tram in to work this morning (initially), and hiding them at work (initially). But nowā€¦ itā€™s no big deal.

So I should just do more stuff like this which scares me.

Itā€™ll be fine, and Iā€™ll feel much better for doing it4.

  1. Iā€™ve not figured out what my gender actually more specifically than ā€œnot-maleā€Ā ↩

  2. e.g. an emery board, Q-Tips, and nail varnish remover, which I went out and bought to remove this excuseĀ ↩

  3. Technically, I came up with the idea as a kind of new-yearā€™s resolution thing at the start of January, but I donā€™t think I actually did it until I got back from FOSDEM.Ā ↩

  4. And Iā€™ve done a blog post about it now, so I have to do it, right? šŸ˜‰Ā ↩