the second life of marx dudek

Writing about myself is, more often than not, discomfort incarnate.  I am my own most difficult subject, which frustrates, as few things consume me more than the desire to be known and genuinely understood.  In the interest of letting thoughts flow as freely as possible, I ask you to indulge my stream-of-consciousness as I attempt to provide some insight into the person you know as Marx.

As I look back on three years as a virtual being, and what appealed to me the most about Second Life – the promise of greater self-discovery – I realize that I know about as much about myself as I did when I signed up in December of 2007.  I could interpret this as validation that I have been true to myself all along.  Either that, or I could interpret it to mean that I’ve spent most of my life hiding behind a mask.

Those who have known me for any period of time know that I spend most of my Second Life in the form of a rabbit.  While I make no secret about the fact that I am a “furry” – and I will be more than happy to answer questions or challenge preconceived notions of exactly what that means – my form is truly a metaphor of the one who dwells behind the face … and the whiskers, and the ears.  Unlike many SL furs, I enjoy being a human in Second Life as well.  I don’t know that I would feel complete being just one or the other, nor do I feel compelled to choose.  I will often pick one or the other based on where I am, or what I am doing, or with whom – although I am more likely to feel comfortable being “Marxibun” around other humans than I am being human around other furs.  Confronting this fact as I write it out leaves me feeling rather unsettled, actually.  I love my human aspect.  Why be self-conscious about being human in a furry environment?  Am I being discriminatory?  Projecting my own insecurities on others?  If I’m the same person inside, should it matter?  And if someone judges me based on fur – or lack thereof – should I be overly concerned about their opinion?

While growing up, my mother was my greatest influence – a strong woman with a passion for fairness, justice and compassion.  She helped define the liberal values that I cling to tenaciously.  After my father died, my mother married a dyed-in-the-wool Texan and her worldview took a hard right-turn.  Before too long, the views that I embraced were now under constant withering attack by the very parent who had instilled them in me.  The change was – and still is – quite a shock to me.  The night before I created my Second Life account, there was a particularly unpleasant confrontation between me and my mother over my continued opposition to the War in Iraq.  Near the end of our conversation, she declared that I was “a godless Marxist Communist who needs to get on [my] knees and pray to God for forgiveness”.  (Did I happen to mention that my mother had moved to a remote area of Texas and relied on Fox News as her window to the outside world?  Yeah, that.)

So, click forward one day ahead, and I am being pressed by an online friend of mine from Norway to sign up for Second Life.  After dismissing it as something I had already tried earlier that same year and found to be boring, I was asked to give it another chance.  Unable to remember the password for the first account I had created, I made a new one.  With the previous evening’s argument with my mom still fresh in my mind, I snarkily typed in “Marx” – figuring that this foray into Second Life would be as short-lived as the first one, so it really didn’t matter what name I picked.  (I chose Dudek simply because of how it sounded, because it was similar to “Brubeck”, who is one of my favorite jazz musicians.  I later discovered that it means “twenty” in Esperanto.)  Knowing now what I didn’t know then, would I choose a different name?  Not on your life.  I love it.

Remembering my first year, I am equally horrified … and proud.  I began my virtual life as the biggest tomboy you could imagine!  I sported short-cropped hair, an awkward body shape, and an almost militant opposition to makeup.  I was also quite stridently an intergendered avatar.  My SL look, and body, and mannerisms reflected a longstanding ambivalence toward gender roles – one which followed me from my real life into my virtual one.  In Second Life, however, the body I had chosen for myself often left me feeling awkward – particularly at those moments when I disrobed in front of others.  (I am not particularly fond of the word “hermaphrodite”, but in the interest of being easily understood, that’s what I was for the first eight months of my Second Life.)

It was during this time that I met the person who has become my partner, my equal, my mate and the habit I have no intention of breaking.  She never showed any intention of wanting to change me – she loved me as I was, without hesitation, condition or exception.  When I decided to place my virtual self clearly on one side of the Gender Divide, she neither criticized nor celebrated.  She continued to do what she had done from almost the moment that we first met.

She accepted me.

Do I regret my decision?  That is a difficult question.  Expectations of gender can present a burden, especially when you don’t feel as though you belong to one or the other – or worse, when you feel the Battle of the Sexes raging within your own body on a daily basis.  Living a gender-neutral life does afford a certain freedom that is lacking in society’s feminine/masculine roles.  It does put a strain on me – as Marx – sometimes – but why should it?

That’s a very good question.

(To be continued.)