Steve Fellner
Are You There Judy? It’s Me, Steve.
I
can still remember the fun in being a closeted gay junior high kid reading
aloud the dirty parts of Judy Blume’s Forever with a bunch of unpopular, smart girls. We hid from our teachers and fellow
students during recess, hiding behind bushes, giggling over the passages
describing sex between Katherine and Michael, the explicit details of their
bodies rubbing against one another, leading to more explicit sexual
behavior. Sometimes we skipped
over the scenes of actual fornication and moved onto one of our favorite parts:
the scene in which Michael reveals his penis’ nickname, Ralph.
We
never knew why he chose that name.
The
girls asked me if my penis had a name.
It was one of the few times when I was around them that I remembered I
was a boy. When I read passages
from Forever in front of an
audience of girls, I became Katherine, that female narrator, and I was so happy
to be someone else. She was full
of so much strength, frustration, and fear that I identified with her more than
any male protagonist. My queer
identity disappeared, an identity that I didn’t have the courage to embrace
whole-heartedly, and I could latch onto those heroines, merge my personality
with theirs, pretend that their narratives were my own.
I
never felt much attraction to the popular books that dealt with male
rite-of-passages. They always
seemed oddly dull. I tried to read
Lord of The Flies. It was about a bunch of boys stranded on a
deserted island who have to fight for their survival. Not only did they war with nature, but also among
themselves. I felt a faint
identification with Piggy: bumbling and a bit desperate, physically graceless,
clinging to my coke-bottle thick glasses.
I couldn’t believe he persevered for as long as he did after his glasses
were smashed. If mine broke, I
knew that that would be the end of me.
I never did finish the book.
It was too painful to read the rest after Piggy’s tragedy; I threw the
book into the fireplace when no one was looking. I always suspected, probably unfairly, that Piggy was a
closeted young homosexual: smart, cultured, unloved, cramming food in his mouth
as a substitute for his failure to be touched, desired.
I,
too, was well-read and gaining weight quick. So scared of my own queerness, I didn’t want to have any
proof of what could happen to me, even if that proof was a fiction. I knew that I deserved to triumph, and
Blume’s young female narrators revealed that potential.
One
of the wonderful things about Blume’s books was reading the way her
descriptions of sex oscillated between the emotional and the clinical. A lot of her scenes involved lengthy
conversations about desire, both the male and female openly admitting their
excitement and reservations about taking the next step. As a closeted gay kid, I fantasized
about meeting someone as cool as Michael, as articulate and as resourceful as
Katherine. In one chapter, after
her grandmother sends her birth control information, Katherine makes an
appointment at the Planned Parenthood Clinic. She receives a pelvic exam and a prescription for birth
control pills. Blume presents the
narrative in a matter-of-fact way, which makes the reader that much more
comfortable if she chooses to emulate Katherine’s actions. There’s nothing odd or inherently
dramatic in taking care of one’s body.
As a closeted gay kid, I didn’t know what precautions I should take with
mine. What health concerns were
different for a gay man than a woman?
No book answered that, at least none that I was aware of.
Of
course, critics freaked out and criticized the book. Lou Willet Stanek in The Arizona English Bulletin referred to Forever as a “problem novel…that is as explicit as a sex
manual.” But through seeing
Katherine deal with her needs so deftly, even insisting that Michael use a
condom during sex, I imagined that one day I could engage in healthy sex,
maturely and with the necessary protections. People were out there offering the information, and all you
had to do was ask.
For
me, the scariest parts of Forever
involve the character of Artie.
Artie is the boyfriend of Erica, who is Katherine’s best friend. Blume constructs many extended scenes
between Artie and Erica discussing sex, emphasizing Artie’s fear, a fear so
significant that he does eventually confess his ultimate terror: his impotence
may be connected to his suspicion of his own homosexuality. This was not the sort of gay character
I wanted to represent me. If any
of the girls on the playground began talking about Erica and Artie, I deflected
the conversation back to the fun sex scenes, praising Katherine for wanting to
play dirty word Scrabble. How I
marveled that she possessed enough confidence to think of enough words for the
duration of an entire match! I
loved her; I wanted to be her.
But
Artie creeped me out. I wanted him
to disappear from the book, and sure enough, he does. After Erica breaks up with him, we find out that Artie tries
to hang himself: “On Thursday morning, Michael’s birthday, Artie hung himself
from the shower curtain rod in his bathroom. Luckily, the rod broke and he fell into the tub, winding up
with a concussion and an assortment of cuts and bruises.” It’s never said why Artie tried to kill
himself, but we can infer based on his earlier pronouncement. Michael admits to not having listened
to him (was he afraid that he might be implicated if his friend came out? was
he scared of his own urges?); Erica confesses her own heartlessness in breaking
up with him so abruptly. In a
novel obsessed with allowing the characters to talk at such seemingly unedited
length, it comes off as a surprise that we never are given a scene that allows
Artie to explicitly name the reasons behind his suicide attempt. In fact, he never enters the novel
again, and I remember being happy that Blume kept him at a distance. His unabashed homosexual panic didn’t
lead anywhere constructive, and I needed possibility, not another
representation of a suicidal closeted gay teen who seemed to be a failure on
every level, even his inability to orchestrate a successful suicide.
If
someone was going to be a victim, I wanted them to be at least a full-bodied,
three-dimensional character. That
was what I got from the next book of hers I read: Blubber.
But having re-read Blubber
recently, essentially the story of the trials and the tribulations of a fat
girl, I was surprised by how much the book avoids the pitfalls of a traditional
victim narrative. The story
focuses on the relationship between three girls: Linda, the geeky, fat girl;
Wendy, a pretty, obnoxious teen, who wants to humiliate Linda; Jill, a friend
of Wendy’s, who slowly comes to empathize with Linda, and eventually tries to
rescue her.
I
remember reading the first scene of the book in which the fat girl Linda
Fischer gives a report on whales.
Linda’s obliviousness of course allows Wendy, her main nemesis, a
perfect opportunity to humiliate her in front of an entire class. What is remarkable about this set-up is
that Linda in a way is complicit in her own humiliation. Her debasement becomes predicated on
her inability to foresee the dangers in giving a speech about an animal (the
whale) she resembles. You can’t
help but read the scene and feel frustration toward Linda for not avoiding the
inevitable through self-awareness.
Scenes
like this affected me in a profound way.
As a visibly gay kid growing up, I wondered how much of my pain was
self-inflicted, how much was beyond my control? By identifying with this narrator, there were no easy
answers, no matter how much I wanted them out of sheer convenience, the
understandable desire for scapegoating.
Gym class was always the predictable place for emotional torture. I remember having to do laps around the
gymnasium. A group of kids would
always follow me and punch me in the arm, try to trip me. Sometimes I would deliberately fall to
the ground, make a spectacle of my plunge, just so they would receive their
entertainment and then go away, harm someone else.
My
best friend Alicia was as large as Linda, but no one teased her. She would turn out to be my closest
queer alliance, and bodyguard. If
anyone would give me a hard time, she would frighten then off, stare them down,
raise her fists. Not only was she
tough, she was smart. No way would
she ever be seen as doing something as idiotic as giving a speech about the
humpback whale to a bunch of bored teens.
When
Blubber was released, I
remember reading reviews in the school library. I recently managed to find one of them in a critical study
of Judy Blume; of Blubber,
the critic Richard Jackson said, “I think Judy is saying something quite nervy
in this book: that is, there are some people who, because of the way they
behave, inspire cruelty. I think
one of Judy’s points is you can cast yourself into a loser role. And that’s your choice.”
When
I first had read this interpretation as a pre-teen, I felt exhilarated and
frightened. Was my ridicule a
result of my inability to disguise my queerness in a more successful manner? In gym class, I did run away from the
soccer ball whenever it darted in my direction. It was my choice to always tag-along with the girls during
recess, avoiding my male classmates who like to climb the jungle gym, play
Smear the Queer on the blacktop. I
could change. All I had to do was
put my mind to it.
Unable
to claim ignorance, I knew why people singled me out for ridicule; my
self-insight should be able to help me alter my social situation.
But
at the same there was only so much I could change about myself. If Linda lost weight, other people’s
respect for her would increase.
Specific markings of my queer identity –my whinny voice, effeminate
nature- could only be changed so much.
I was who I was. Walking
bowlegged and talking in a deep voice could only conceal my essential nature
for so long, and how convincing would such changes be?
Growing
up, I often spent a lot of time with my uncle. Even though no one would openly say it, everyone knew he was
gay, and no one cared. He was a
sweet guy, and when he came over, he told me stories about a man named Oscar
Wilde. He never once said that
Wilde was gay, but explained that a lot of “people in power were jealous that
he had really intense relationships with young people.”
“Why
did people care?” I asked him.
“People
don’t like people who have a lot of friends,” he said, “They get jealous.”
He
then told me that the “people in power” tried to hurt Wilde, because they were
so intimated of his social skills.
They put him on trial and tried to condemn him. I loved the idea of a trial, and the
fact that someone, according to my uncle, could be sentence to death for simply
being friendly fascinated me.
I
liked myself for being such a social outcast, someone no one paid attention
to. No one wanted to be my friend,
especially young people. I was
safe from the cruel world.
One
time I told him about Blubber
and read aloud to him the climatic scene which involves a trial. I thought for sure he’d appreciate it,
and his approval of me mattered.
In the scene, Linda is put on trial by her classmates, led by
Wendy. Only one student attempts
to protect Linda, a girl named Jill, who has always been disturbed by Linda’s
victimization. Jill demands that
Linda receives a lawyer, someone to defend her. Infuriated, Wendy turns on Jill, mocking her. By defending Linda, Jill suffers from
serious social fall-out, being the last one chosen for a sports team and ends
up having no partner for a school trip.
As
I was reading the scene about Jill, my uncle stopped me mid-sentence and
exclaimed, “That’s why no one defended Oscar Wilde.”
I
didn’t understand the connection.
“Everyone
was afraid that they would be identified with him.”
I
was still confused, so I let him try again to make necessary correlations.
“Victimization
is contagious. Or so people
think. If you hang around a
victim, you’ll become one yourself.”
“Jill
doesn’t end up a victim,” I said, “If you let me finish, you would have found
out that she fights back against Wendy.”
“Good
for her,” my uncle said, “You should follow her example.”
He
paused and then said, “There have been so many times in my life I wanted to be
like Jill. But I’ve always kept my
mouth shut.”
“Everyone
likes you,” I said.
“They
like what I allow them to know about me,” he said.
I
got nervous, so I said, “Let me finish the scene.”
My
family members became skittish about my obsession with Judy Blume. When my mother discovered that I was
reading Are You There God? It’s
Me, Margaret, she forbid me to
read it, grabbing the book from my hands and then hiding the book in her
bedroom.
“That
book divulges women’s secrets,” she said.
“The
fact that a woman gets a period is a national secret?” I said.
“Don’t
be a smart mouth,” she said, “It’s just something you shouldn’t read. It’s a book for women by a woman. Men have no right in reading in it. Even sweet little boys like you.”
“But
I’m curious.”
“Be
curious about your own sexuality.
Leave ours alone.”
What
I failed to tell my mother was that I couldn’t be curious about my own
sexuality; I feared that if I found out something in a book, I would turn out
to be one of them—a doomed, suicidal, teen homosexual who would be used by
abusive, older men. I was
convinced I was the only boy in the world grappling with his sexuality.
My
favorite scenes in Are You There God?
It’s Me, Margaret revolved
around Margaret and her new friends’ secret club. I remember fantasizing about the fun they must have had in
agreeing upon a name for their organization: the PTS club, or Pre-Teen
Sensations. I loved the rules they
had: they could not wear socks with their loafers; they each kept a Boy Book
with a current list of the cutest boys.
Another rule was they all had to wear bras no matter how flat-chested
they were. And most importantly:
“The first one to get her period had to tell the others about it. Especially how it feels.”
At
one PTS meeting, the girls compare their breasts to the ones of models in a Playboy magazine that Margaret steals from her father’s
dresser drawer. They end the
meeting with the ritual of repeating the mantra “We Must Increase Our Busts”
fifty times and other assorted exercises to accelerate their womanhood.
Blume
describes the scenes in such an effective way. You can feel the joy, tension, and competitiveness in these
girls’ solidarity. Blume’s talent
as a writer partly came from her creating for us the opportunity to gaze
voyeuristically at our own secrets.
Through her empathy for her protagonists, she allows us to identify with
them so that our secrets conflated with theirs, and we could exhibit them,
boldly, proudly, and happily.
Of
course, my secrets didn’t reveal themselves until college, but reading about
the PTS club helped mitigate my frustration for a number of years. Eventually, I thought, I’ll find a club
of like-minded people, and we’ll form our own group and silly rules.
I
can still remember the first coming-out group I joined at the University of
Illinois-Urbana-Champaign.
Everyone was uptight, nervous, constantly looking over their shoulder to
make sure that no one was spying on them.
You could also feel everyone in the room hoping they didn’t appear as
gay and as insecure as the person who just spoke. I remember spacing out as someone told his uneventful coming
out story. I felt jealousy towards
Margaret and her friends teasing one another, glad to be in each other’s
company.
Issues
of truth and secrecy take center stage in Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret.
One of the most tense scenes in the book occurs when Margaret finds out
her friend Nancy has lied about her period: “I didn’t know what to say to
say. I mean, what can you say when
you just found out your friend’s a liar!”
I imagined the day my friends would find out I was gay. Would they be similarly un-empathetic
in their reaction? How could I
lessen the intensity of their reactions?
Each day that I waited to disclose my sexuality, the more justification
they had for a more volatile response.
They would call me worse things than a liar.
When
Blume started to write books for adults, people like my mother, I felt
betrayed. Blume was supposed to be
on our side. She had no right to
show any empathy for anyone else other than kids. No author other than Blume managed to represent our hidden
desires, to make a spectacle of our secret interiority. So when I snuck a peak at the back
cover of my mother’s copy of Wifey,
I was enraged as I read one of the blurbs that exclaimed: “You will enjoy this
book…HIDE IT WHERE THE CHILDREN WON’T SEE IT!”
How
could Blume? How could she switch
sides? There’s no way she could
keep our secrets in tact. When you
write about two opposing factions, you always take sides; it’s inevitable. Blume was no longer an ally. At the same time I was curious about my
mother’s secrets, which I assumed were contained in the narrative of Wifey. I
scanned the book for any clues.
The
book revolved around the escapades of a bored housewife named Sandy
Pressman. Her husband Norman is
well-meaning, but a bit of a dolt.
Sandy tried to find self-satisfaction in a series of escapades. I can still remember the scene in which
Sandy confessed her boredom to a friend named Lisbeth. Lisbeth gives her some advice: she
tells Sandy that she and her husband sleep with other people on Thursday
nights. The only stipulation is
that they’re both required to tell the other every single detail about the
encounter.
As
Lisbeth declares, “Everything must be out in the open…that’s the only rule…no
secrets…this class I took last semester in Contemporary Relationships was
fabulous…how showed us how secrets cause strains. This opennness has caused such a boon in our marriage.”
Coincidentally,
when I was secretly reading these sections, my parents’ marriage was falling
apart. My father was rarely coming
home, sometimes disappearing for a few days at a time without even a phone call
alerting us as to his whereabouts.
My mother walked around depressed, going to bed around 6 p.m.,
forgetting to make me dinner.
One
day I decided to confront her: “You and dad are so unhappy.”
“Tell
me something I don’t know.”
“Maybe
you should follow Lisbeth’s advice.”
“Who
is Lisbeth?”
“Don’t
play dumb,” I said.
“I
have no idea who Lisbeth is.”
“Lisbeth
from the porn you read! Lisbeth
and her husband who sleep with everyone in their town so they don’t have to
touch each other!”
“You’re
going into my room and reading my books?”
“At
least I’m learning something from them,” I said, “You’re so stupid you’re going
to make dad leave us. Let him
sleep with someone else other than you.”
My
mother slapped me across the face.
“He is doing that,” she said, “He knows I know. That’s why he can’t face me. Or you.”
I
walked away and decided I’d stick to my own books, maybe even read something as
tame as Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing. Adult books seemed to
get me in trouble.