Lady Looks Like a Dude

Every few years I get mistaken for a man.

As a child I was constantly mistaken for a boy. I fooled myself into thinking it was a gestalt thing: My parents had two older boys, so I suppose the brains of onlookers were driven toward the perception of continuity. (It didn't help that my hair was short and I wore my brothers' hand-me-downs.)

But what do you do when you're mistaken for a man at twenty? The first time it happened during my adult life, I was working as a ride operator at a renaissance fair(e). The ride had a lot of protruding parts that could have caught and ripped long skirts, so I wore the men's uniform: white billowy shirt, knickers, floppy cap. The job was grueling -- no mechanized parts, everything set into motion via man- or womanpower -- so we took frequent rest breaks.

One day I was lying back on a bench near the ride when a man right next to me told his son, "Shhhh, don't disturb him. He's napping. These boys work hard." I also received plenty of "thank you sirs" at the conclusion of the ride. I never corrected anyone because, in a strange and unexpected way, it was fun being in drag.

But the second time it happened -- I was rollerblading dressed shoulder-to-knee in spandex -- was understandably less pleasant. I was actually called a "fag" by a bunch of guys on a park bench. Okay, I get it: I'm flat-chested. And guys nowadays wear their hair long, so my ponytail was no giveaway. But don't hips count for something?

Good grief.

Neither of these experiences, however, compared to Sunday's event. Never in my wildest dreams did it occur to me that I would be mistaken for a man at nearly 7 months pregnant.

I was waiting my turn in a line of five or six people in an airport shop. The person in front of me paid for his items and turned away. At that point the clerk looked me squarely in the face and said, "Can I help you sir?" There was a 3-second moment of silence during which her face contorted in shock at her mistake. I don't know what tipped her off. My pink blush and lipstick? My big hoop earrings? My purse? My DRESS?

Everyone in line laughed anxiously as I decided how to handle the situation. As usual, I tried to be funny: "Hey, this is a pregnant belly, not a beer belly." Heh heh. She muttered something about my height and quickly gave me my change, hoping I'd get out of there pronto. Mortified, I complied.

As someone who's always considered herself to be fairly androgynous, I've had trouble accepting my pregnancy because it's just so female. Pregnancy brands a woman completely and totally by her sex -- not her gender, her sex. But being branded a man when one is a woman, and a pregnant woman at that, is flat-out alarming. It's like walking around with your name on your shirt and still being called something else. It makes you wonder what it is about you that screams MAN. I realize I'm tall and lanky and don't have much in the upper rack of the dishwasher, but don't a hairless face and arched eyebrows count for anything?

Sigh. Now I know why my parents made me wear a tiny gold bracelet when I was a toddler. And why people put those ridiculous stretchy pink headbands on their female infants. It's not done in an effort to introduce the kid to gender norms before she's even tried solid foods; it's done as a warning to other people: "Don't you dare call my little she a HE."

I wonder if they make those headbands in adult sizes.