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The clearest metaphor I had for my own gender identity in college was the image of a scale. A huge weight had been placed on one side, without my permission. I was constantly trying to weigh down the other side. But the end goal wasn’t masculinity—the goal was balance.

Maia seeks to counteract the perception that e’s a girl by tipping the balance of the metaphorical gender scale in the other direction. An illustration shows Maia adding weights labeled “name,” “pronouns,” “hormones,” and “top surgery” to the right side of a scale that already contains “short hair” and “baggy boy clothes,” yet is still weighted down on the left side by a heavy object labeled “assigned female at birth.” As Maia acknowledges, eir aim is not to be perceived as a man, but rather as not a woman. Maia will later update this metaphor as eir understanding of gender continues to evolve.

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