I've been fostering a transitioning child for several months now, she's becoming female having been identified at birth as male.
Her new name is Alicia.
Alicia has a couple of friends at her school who are on the same journey as her, and they spend time together. She tells me she and her friends are also included in other friendship groups, and that none of the pupils give them any trouble.
Kids today seem wonderfully cool about the whole thing.
No, it's some of the adults they have to deal with who often upset them.
There's one lady who works behind the counter in the convenience store used by many pupils to pick up a can of something or a bag of crisps.
I dare some some of them will try to buy a vape or even a tin of cider; kids will be kids.
Anyhoo, I'm getting the impression from Alicia that this particular woman behind the counter sees part of her job as policing the world against the threats posed by the young. You know the sort of adult; she's bossy about them queueing in a single line even those who aren't buying anything but merely accompanying a friend. There's no law against that, but she invokes one, apparently shouting that a 'scrum is what shoplifters want'. Alicia is afraid she'll make a rude remark.
Another example, there's one bus driver who examines their ID with intense scrutiny making them wait and feel uncomfortable, clearly hoping to discover it's fake, or expired. He's rumoured to have 'found' a fake card once and ostentatiously cut it up with a pair of scissors on his milti-tool that was probably carried around for just that reason.
Alicia has a bus ID card, but the image on it of her is different from how she looks now. So she never uses it. She's so self conscious about her status that she won't risk it for fear of anyone questioning her.
Which is no business of anyone else, but some adults seem to think they owe it to their forebears to go to war for what they see as good old-fashioned values. Which appear to include giving young people a hard time.
Alicia walks to and from school.
And it's not only the foot soldiers of the world who have lost the battle to be caring.
Unbelievably there are not one but three teachers at her school who are said to quietly make sure that Alicia knows that she is really a boy.
I've actually met one of them. When I say 'met' I mean it was a Parents evening via Zoom, and the teacher began by say "I wouldn't say he's doing well, he tends to be rather lazy and…"
He tapered off. Then he continued with a theatrical "I'm sorry…I keep forgetting…it's 'she' isn't it?".
The whole petty little moment was deliberately aimed at letting me know what he thought. I found myself staring at a man who wanted, more than anything else, for me to feel impressed by his noble dismissal of something he was too lazy to learn about…
Ironic really, him going on about Alicia being lazy.
And an uphill battle for the likes of Alicia.
She doesn't pose any threat to anybody, merely hopes to live her life being the person she is certain she is.
When I first came into fostering I never thought I'd be working with a child on such a courageous project, but I am, and loving it.
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