“Hi, nice to meet you! Can you introduce yourself?”
.
.
My mind goes blank.
.
.
Name
Ace Molloy
Age
21
Major
Creative Writing
Minor
Disability Studies
Those come easily enough. But what else? What do they want to know? Maybe turning a question towards them will help.
“How are you doing today?”
“Great, how are you?”
And suddenly empty pleasantries are turned my way. I hate this question; there’s never a good answer.
“I’m great!”
This is the answer polite society wants me to give, but I never was good at lying.
“I’m hanging in there.”
Maybe an answer that isn’t too honest or a lie is, as fairy tales say, “just right.”
“Frankly, not fantastic.”
This is honest and truest to me, but then…
awkward silence
and
questions.
I would have to explain that my chronic pain is flaring up, and chances are the “feel better soon” at the end of the conversation would just make me feel worse.
I can do this. I can play this delicate dance of getting to know another person.
Simple facts are easy enough to start with:
“A fun fact about me is that I really like moths, and the
is my favorite.”
And then I continue on:
“I named myself. Playing cards are really important in my family, so I named myself ‘Ace.’ It’s also just a really cool name.”
Then I can gradually get more and more detailed with things the other person can learn about me.
Disability and queerness and hometown and likes and dislikes and so on.
Maybe, if they are trans too, I’ll even let them know my hard thoughts, the ones that cis people won’t understand. I’ll let them know how
And there’s more to me. Stuff that I don’t think of when people go around a circle with introductions.
When looking at yourself provides a kaleidoscope of colors, it can be hard to answer the question,
“Who are you?”
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