“I wish people would just do their own research on transgender people more often. Most of the time, when they ask questions, it’s just exhausting because I’m expected to answer on behalf of my whole community, instead of just myself.” The message sat on my phone screen, a text bubble against the background of a dating app. At first, it felt like an accusatory finger, stabbing out at me, proclaiming me a bad person. I reread the message, and then a third time, considering my response. My hunger for knowledge had overridden my social skills.
“You’re right,” I typed finally. “I can’t expect you to speak for transgender people, any more than I can speak for all gay men.” And then, “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to be invasive.”
“It’s okay,” he replied. “Most people, especially on here, just seem to forget that they’re holding an internet machine in their hand. All the information you could want is out there if you look for it.” I paused and looked at my phone. Not at the screen, or the words that appeared on it, but at the phone itself. An internet machine, he called it. It certainly wasn’t a misnomer. We were, after all, talking over a dating app, which was itself fed by the internet.
His comment was prompted by my asking questions that people frequently ask of those whose gender does not match their sex assigned at birth. When did you know you were transgender? How did you know? Have you had “the surgery” yet? Why not? What does “the surgery” entail? How do they do it? He said these questions were exhausting, and why shouldn’t they be? I remembered when I came out in the early 2000s, and people were asking me whether I was the man or the woman in my relationships. We were both men, and that was the point, but the question came over and over. Exhausting.
I was born in December of 1982 before the internet age began. I grew up a reader. I was obsessed with books from an early age, sometimes read the newspaper with my grandpa, and had a subscription to 3-2-1 Contact Magazine that I devoured monthly. At school, I read my textbooks dutifully. Trips to the library overjoyed me—both school and public—frequently jumping at the chance to research something in the encyclopedia or card catalog. I loved knowledge. I remember the issue of 3-2-1 Contact Magazine that first foretold the coming of the Information Superhighway, and I read that article until the paper was so crinkled and brittle as to be unsalvageable. The idea of the entirety of human knowledge at my fingertips, from the comfort of my own home, was intoxicating to a 9-year-old who loved nothing better than to read and learn.
Where I had a knack for learning, I sorely lacked in social skills. I did not know how to relate to my classmates, and could often be found reading, by myself, when others were playing. Face-to-face interaction was usually a disaster because I did not realize I was the butt of the joke—or worse yet, I did.
On my first day of school at Blue Ridge Junior High, I arrived for my first class of the day which was, to my chagrin, P.E. We had just moved to Farmer City the week before, it was early November, and we were in the midst of the second quarter of the school year. Already backward and shy, I also had to contend with the reality of small-town life. Most of my classmates had known each other from early childhood, so being the new kid meant I was an outsider, in addition to being awkward, bookish, small for my age, and the youngest in my class.
Another eighth-grader approached me on the bleachers, leaned down to look through my thick glasses and into my eyes, and said, “Welcome to Blue Ridge Junior High,” in an exaggerated nasal tone. I shyly thanked him, simultaneously aware of how nasally my voice naturally sounded and praying he did not notice. Other nearby students laughed. Outside, I blushed but tried my best to act calm. Inwardly, I shrank, and at least a little of that must have shown on my face because they only laughed harder.
Most of my days the rest of that school year were much like that one. I did my best to stay small, quiet, and out of the way, and while my classmates were not frequently cruel, neither were they remarkably kind. The only things I enjoyed doing in my free time were reading fantasy novels and watching Star Trek or Gargoyles, and if any of my classmates shared those pastimes, they weren’t open for discussion. It was a lonely time. Though, in turn, I learned to be reasonably self-sufficient even when I wasn’t exceptionally self-confident. The turning point for me was the coming of internet access.
The summer between my graduation from eighth grade, and the start of my freshman year, a man who worked in my dad’s office was looking for somewhere affordable to start an internet provider in Farmer City. My dad offered a deal; he could set up the operation in our house, as long as we could get a direct line into the system. In a day and age where dial-up was the only option for most, I had unrestricted access to a T1 line. While I had long forgotten 3-2-1 Contact, the appeal of the internet and all it had to offer were not lost on me. I spent hours poring over articles, searching for whatever topic crossed my mind, and it was here that my love of science fiction and fantasy crossed paths with others.
One of my favorite fantasy series was the Forgotten Realms series, which turned out to be a Dungeons & Dragons campaign setting. In my scouring of the internet, I discovered a then-already-out-of-print campaign setting called Spelljammer, which was essentially Dungeons & Dragons in Space. Though the publishers were no longer making the game, it had a community of online followers who had created a large body of content, and they welcomed newcomers into the fold. This was still before the days of social media, but through an active email list, we shared stories and developed friendships that centered on our common interest. The mailing list eventually faded away, but for a few years, it provided me respite and social connection where I lacked it in my day-to-day life.
By the time smartphones, social media, and online dating became ubiquitous, the arguments were beginning that the internet would be the death of social connection. The popular image of the millennial, phone in hand, lacking any interest in connecting with others in their physical vicinity. Yet, for me, I found it to be distinctly the opposite. This technology made it so much easier for me to connect and placed into my hands a constant stream of new information, hand-delivered by a combination of Facebook algorithms and like-minded friends. I am not saying that social media has no downside, nor that I have not misused it myself as a maladaptive coping strategy when I was overstressed. But, for a divorcé in my thirties who had no idea how to meet people, online dating was a godsend.
And so it was that I encountered this man on the other side of the screen and struck up a conversation. His words echoed in my head. After we ended our conversation that night, I stayed up, searching for information and resources, cross-referencing sources to make sure what I was getting was accurate information, and that I was getting my terms right.
According to a 2017 article in Forbes magazine, this particular aspect of the online dating world is not unique to me. A study by the National Academy of Sciences cited in the article showed that relationships that began online reported being more satisfied with their partners and that those partnerships lasted longer. Online dating also corresponded to a higher number of interracial marriages—again with stronger, happier couples—as a result of having access to more information cross-culturally that allows partners to understand each other better earlier in the relationship. In a not-so-dissimilar fashion, my conversation partner and I had the opportunity to know certain things about one another, such as his being transgender, before interacting in person. Where there were gaps in my knowledge, I was able to research and reference this information, enabling me to connect with him better on a personal level.
At the start of our next conversation, I asked a more pointed, personal question that had come up as a result of my frenzied night of reading and learning.
“Well,” he said, “someone’s been doing their research.”
Our conversation flowed so naturally from that point, in a way it would never have had we been face-to-face. By the time we first met for coffee, we already had a mutual understanding and respect for one another. As we have just passed the fifth anniversary of that coffee date, I often laugh when people sneer at social media or the internet as being the downfall of interpersonal connection. Without those inventions, I would never have met the man I call my husband today.
Daniel K. Sheff 