I was talking with a coworker recently and she declared that I was entirely, completely, fascinating. Now, if I’d just shared my theory of educational reform with her, this would make more sense, and I’d be flattered. But, no, I hadn’t done anything of the sort. In fact, all I’d shared with her was that I love cuddling. I also love a whole lot of things that, if you hear that I was born female, make a little more sense. Even so, I hesitated to tell her that I was trans. I figured that maybe there was a different lesson to be learned here.

For the record, I do enjoy cuddling. I love the feeling of intimacy that comes from having a girl’s legs tangled in mine as we watch a movie. I love having my hair played with, or running my fingers up and down someone else’s arm. When I don’t get any physical contact for awhile, I actively miss it. Is this remarkable? I never thought so, but apparently it was to her. The fact that I like cuddling, regularly bake, make care packages for my sister when she’s having a tough week and say I love you when I hang up the phone with friends were all factoids that completely blew this particular coworker’s mind.

Of course, her reaction does sound somewhat less surprising if you realize that I’m a man who, by all visible markers, is both heterosexual and biologically male. Though I sleep with men, I don’t date them, so they never appear on my arm at an office function. When I tell stories about past relationships, I speak only of ex-girlfriends. And, while I’ve got any number of exciting details to my body that she’d never dream of, that’s not really something that comes up at the water cooler. So when she told me I was fascinating and I realized that she believed I was a straight, cisgender man, I considered just telling her. “Hey, listen,” I’d say, “I’m actually transgender. It all makes more sense when you realize I was socialized to be a girl, huh?” The conversation might skip a beat, but she’d recover quickly and say “Yeah, it really does. That’s cool.”

That’s how I imagine the conversation going, at least. I also imagine that she’d go away from the conversation with entirely the wrong message. She’d leave our conversation having further solidified her belief that straight men don’t love cuddling or baking, and certainly aren’t considerate enough to make care packages, nor in touch with their feelings enough to admit love for a friend on a regular basis. She might have doubted herself for a minute there but then, hey, I came to the rescue and explained away the apparent aberration of a straight guy who is comfortable with his more traditionally feminine attributes.

So, I stayed silent. Someday I might tell her but, for now, I like the effect I’m having on her. It’s not often that I educate people and stretch their comfort limits by not coming out, and it feels delightfully subversive that it worked out that way this time. And, hey, we actually-quite-ordinary people have to take our thrills where we find them.