(i ripped this off wikipedia real fast so sorry if it's lib)
In October 1776, the Public Universal Friend contracted an epidemic disease and was bedridden and near death with a high fever. Their family summoned a doctor from Attleboro, six miles away, and neighbors kept up a death-watch at night. The fever broke after several days. The Friend later reported that [deadname redacted] had died, receiving revelations from God through two archangels who proclaimed there was "Room, Room, Room, in the many Mansions of eternal glory for Thee and for everyone". The Friend further said that [deadname redacted]'s soul had ascended to heaven and the body had been reanimated with a new spirit charged by God with preaching his word, that of the "Publick Universal Friend", describing that name in the words of Isaiah 62:2 as "a new name which the mouth of the Lord hath named".
From that time on, the Friend refused to answer to their deadname, ignoring or chastising those who insisted on using it. When visitors asked if it was the name of the person they were addressing, the Friend simply quoted Luke 23:3 ("thou sayest it"). Identifying as neither male nor female, the Friend asked not to be referred to with gendered pronouns. Followers respected these wishes; they referred only to "the Public Universal Friend" or short forms such as "the Friend" or "P.U.F.", and many avoided gender-specific pronouns even in private diaries. When someone asked if the Friend was male or female, the preacher replied "I am that I am", saying the same thing to a man who criticized the Friend's manner of dress (adding, in the latter case, "there is nothing indecent or improper in my dress or appearance; I am not accountable to mortals").
editorial note: I think this is a very cool story and I really love hearing it. We've been around forever and we've been doing variations of this forever. It's really beautiful
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spoiler
yeah that's not really what i meant, framing it as cis- at all was a mistake. it wasn't a point of comparison to anybody or even about trans people, i just think people who know how to look are neat. and being a man makes me want to walk into the fucking ocean, why would i want to look more masculine than i do. i don't think i'd be on the site if i were like "holy moly just the two genders", so it didn't occur to me that that would even read as transphobic. to the extent that i put anyone on a pedestal, it's more because i am in a chasm far below, as evidenced by my frequent social missteps here and around the country. we're the same species, i'm just a version that is less functional, less effective overall, and apparently very hard to pin down
also, i don't think it'd quite save me from my tribunal to admit to being attracted to nonbinary and trans people mid-argument? maybe i'm off the mark, as is known to happen
i freeze constantly, i basically need other people to indicate that we're actually about to have a conversation and they aren't just saying hi, or merely making eye contact. whenever i see someone that i know, it's like, "what the fuck type of interaction are we about to have" and whenever i see someone i don't know it's like "do i know them? could we be friends? are we in love??" frankly, having misread situations in the past causes me to assume i'm making people uncomfortable by expressing any interest. i never know if someone is going to talk to me like they remember the interactions we have, or if they'll be like "wow it's good to meet you!"
i'm 6'0, lumber like a bear, and speak with a naturally deep voice. regardless of how i feel, i lean masculine in how the world sees me. if i'm supposed to be ashamed, i am.
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i feel like my back is against the wall, like any attempt to gain understanding through explaining myself just subjects me to scrutiny. i wish someone would just get in my face and yell exactly what I'm doing wrong. If I knew the steps, I would follow them perfectly. But nobody will tell them to me. it genuinely feels like there's just information that other people are being handed and i have to fight and argue for the same footing as everyone else. It feels like everything I try to say gets lost in translation. I'm finding a lot less commonality in my gender journey than I anticipated. That may be another misstep or misunderstanding on my part.
do people just change? i keep waiting and hoping for someone to say it's okay, say they're there. is that just never going to happen? I just have to be different? because this is me trying to rally someone, anyone towards my cause, and it's not working.
what if my brain goes back to the void? every step I try to take on my own, that thought lingers. somehow, this is going to go poorly and I will die. because it has gone poorly before, and I died in the sense that everyone forgot about me and stopped talking to me. the bad thing happened, and it can't unhappen. where does that leave me?