Two Headed Girl
Episode 33 artwork
Episode 33 · June 6, 2022 · 00:24:31

33. The Most Midwest

This weekEnjoy a trip with Alex and Matt to the most midwest of places- the Wisconsin Dells. Join us as we discuss navigating a water park resort while openly trans.
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Small Queer Owned Businesses

Here’s a small list of some of Mattie’s favorite queer owned businesses to consider supporting this Pride Month. 

The Trevor Project is also our favorite resource for helping trans youth! 


Thank you to our pals!


Editor:  Quinn @aspiringrobotfm

Music by: Seth Boyer @sethboyer

Art by: Kevin Budnik and Kara Fagan 

@knittedsweater  @karafagan 

Transcript

Tap a timestamp or any sentence to play from there · machine transcribed (mlx:mlx-community/whisper-large-v3-turbo), expect mistakes

AlexHi, I'm Alex Cox. And I'm Mattie Cox. This is a show about gender, our minds, and all sorts of transitions. Welcome to Two Headed Girl.

MattieMatthew, we kind of went on a vacation last weekend. We did. It was for my 32nd birthday and it was a lot of fun. I enjoyed it a lot.

AlexI definitely didn't forget your 32nd birthday.

MattieNo, not at all.

AlexSo you definitely didn't come up to me on May 17th. 17th. 17th.

MattieIt's only been 10 years. It's fine. It's only been 10 years.

AlexIt hasn't been 10 years yet.

MattieYes.

AlexSo May 17th, you woke me up and just asked, what day? See, that's the thing. You didn't wake me up in a mean way and go, what? Like, what day is it? It was just, I was like, hey, what day is it?

MattieAnd you went, Tuesday? And I was like, it's my birthday. And you went, oh my God, it's your birthday. I'm so sorry. It's your birthday. Happy birthday. You were much nicer about it. No, that's, I mean, I was like, it's Tuesday. It's my birthday. It was very cute. I was not mad, especially because we celebrated the weekend before. We went to the Dells, and for anyone who doesn't know what that is, it's the most Midwest of Midwest things you could do.

It's basically just a tourist town where there's a bunch of water parks and mini golf and go-karts just everywhere. That's all that's there.

Alexand both of us went to the dells as a kid because like you said it's kind of a it's a tourist trap but it's also kind of like family friendly vegas in the midwest is how i yeah that's kind of true yeah there's also arcades everywhere which is my favorite part but you wanted to go here because this was going to be the first not not quite the first time But, oh wait, actually, I think this is only the second time you've been able to be in a swimsuit in public post-op surgery.

MattieYes, that is true. So just swim trunks for anyone who is confused.

AlexHow did it feel basically getting to relive childhood memories, but in a body you are far more comfortable in?

MattieI didn't even really think about it before we left, honestly. the the one thing that i did think about was that at the beach when we went to the beach in wisconsin it was a much more red area there were trump signs on boats oh yeah yeah oh that was interesting and we got crap from teenagers there and it was a bad experience for both of us honestly

It kind of like really bummed us out. So I was a little worried that that was going to happen again. And then I realized that people in Wisconsin, at the Dell specifically, I guess, are so busy with their own crap that they didn't even care. Like I know. Also, I'm very lucky in that my scars are light enough that you would have to like really look at me to to notice that they were there. So I feel I feel very lucky. But I when we went swimming the first time, I was a little nervous.

And then I was like, you know, what's the worst that can happen? Like, fuck it.

AlexRight. We're in a resort because our friend Kara came with us and she often accompanies us on vacation.

MattieOur third wheel, our favorite third wheel.

AlexOur third, our favorite accessory, human accessory came with us. And she, too, was like, you can get hate crimed. And I'm like, well, it's a resort. Like, what is, well, quote, resort. Like, it's a water park resort.

MattieLike, everything is in the same spot, so you don't have to leave, basically.

AlexAnd, I mean, I don't know. I wasn't too worried because, I mean, we weren't venturing into the outskirts of Wisconsin. Like, I was most nervous about the drive there because that's always an adventure.

Mattiespecifically stopping at gas stations is always difficult for us like uh in indiana god it's

Alexreally funny how much worse indiana is than every other state we go to well we've never been to

Mattietexas oh fair enough fair enough uh and we are not anytime soon let's put it that way yep nope

Alexdefinitely not uh what was like your first reaction when we arrived i'm trying to lead you to the very funny first interaction we had with the hotel staff oh my god yeah um so we got there

Mattieat like 11 because alex wanted to finish work so we could like enjoy the whole weekend oh excuse me

Alexyou were working late too i worked till five okay anyway that's not the important part why are you interrupting me for this because equal we were equal opportunity at working too late okay we

Mattieboth worked late there you go blah blah blah um and the person that helped us check in at the front desk was clearly like trans femme or like non-binary but femme presenting and I I have a trans tattoo on the inside of my right wrist and I kind of just like set it on the counter my my arm for them to see and it was I don't know it was a great experience I instantly felt I was like

felt super relaxed and I I don't know it was just great and and it was awesome and then we had to

Alextell Kara right away so it's funny how even just one person in a semi-public space who's also queer can put your mind at ease because it's like, all right, this person was working at, again, Midwest Vegas, and I don't know. I didn't even register that that person was queer because

most of my daily interactions are designed to be around other queer people or people who do not give it a second thought or give me a second look. I can just be anonymous in the crowd as I desire. And then we got into our hotel room. And after I accepted that we were going to be in a room that smelled like wet molding bathing suits, you were like, yeah, I mean, we clearly had a nice

interaction with the trans person at the desk. And I was like, well, oh, and it was this nice feeling of oh right whenever you are in a position where you're uncomfortable just having one person who's kind of quote in power i know that that's a stretch but i mean this is technically

Mattielike the people who are running the hotel i wouldn't say in power they were just someone that was working at the desk and it was just nice to be i think authority is probably a better word What you're trying to say, I think, not to, I'm sorry, is that mansplaining?

AlexWell, let's see what you're going to say.

MattieOh, I think the roundabout way of what you're trying to say is that it was just nice to know there was another trans person there that was like visibly queer. So they were visibly queer. So like, obviously, it was a safe space, like instantly to know it was a safe space. And that definitely put me at ease. And I was like, Alright, we're fine. And if we're not fine, like, there's plenty of other places to go. But I was kind of just in most of my outfits accepted as a Midwest dad, which was the best the best option, like the best outcome, I think, because I've grown up here.

So I can definitely Midwest dad for sure.

AlexWhat do you think I was read as? Because I intentionally got like the most, not like the most femme, but the most like Midwest mom bathing suit possible just in an attempt to blend in. Because, again, I just want to enjoy the wave pool and not think about how many kids are peeing in it. That's okay. The water moves.

Mattiehonestly if you want me to be real honest probably as uh kara's girlfriend like as a lesbian oh i definitely i love you but like definitely as a lesbian i i knew lesbian but uh girlfriend of my

Alexplatonic best friend that's so oh i mean they always think and also because like i don't drink

MattieLike you guys spent a lot of time like at the bar together where I was like going on water slides and stuff because I was reliving my youth and you guys were enjoying alcohol and baseball, which is totally fine. I didn't need you to have fun.

AlexOh my God. We were doing the gayest thing possible, which was going to the sports bars and watching baseball.

MattieYeah, they definitely thought you guys were a lesbian couple. And you were like so animately discussing baseball. like yep and animatedly and whatever you were yeah you were into it you were into it you definitely

Alexlooked like like kara was your femme girlfriend yeah because often in public the two of us are we we go at it like sibling oh go at it ew bat poor praising uh we are just normally openly contemptuous to one another where people are very confused about what that's actually that's that's The other problem is we are red as a lesbian couple so much in Chicago because that's just so normal. And Kara often helps me with like things that a normal person would know how to do, like pick out furniture or clothes.

And it's red as ah, she's the girl in the relationship.

MattieYeah, and I just feel like when we're together, no offense, but we are clearly like clocked as a queer couple. We are. And or siblings. We get siblings a lot, which is upsetting. But like.

AlexOh, God.

MattieBut I really think that you got read as just like my friend, basically, which is fine with me. Like we were not being like touchy feely, which.

AlexIntentionally.

MattieWell, yeah. Also, we were around a lot of little kids. Like there were. Oh, yeah. there were embarrassing drunk adults but we're not gonna like make out at a water park right not

Alexexactly a romantic setting yeah i meant more ew i meant more of like you know you can just kind of tell if someone's a couple like for example if they're drinking together and talking about baseball really loudly yep yep yep we were not that except when oh gosh i feel weird like talking about like uh the other queer people around but it's just our waiter was super gay our waiter

Mattiewas super gay so we got to interact with like the clearly two queer people there which uh the the waiter who we had multiple times and then um then you know the um the trans person at the front desk And after that, like, I felt fine. Like, I don't think I felt self-conscious at all. The most self-conscious I felt was when I went in the bathroom. And this is going to be gross.

There was only one stall. No door. And then there were...

AlexAll the male, quote, male bathroom stories are terrible. I'm just preparing. Eight urinals. Oh.

MattieAnd the men would go in there barefoot and pee in the urinal. Barefoot. So then the second day that we went to the water park, I had to bring my STP and I couldn't swim in my STP. So I had to like bring it and then like pretend it was in my bathing suit and then like whip it out. It was very, first of all, it was very like complicated.

AlexYeah.

MattieAnd the nicest bathrooms were in the lobby. and I'm not going to take my bathing suit. Like, I'm not going to walk like 20 minutes to the lobby to go to the bathroom. So I just, but I wore my flip-flops and I washed my hands. So many people, all right, I love to read. We've talked about this many times.

AlexSo many men didn't wash their hands.

MattieYou're at a water park in bare feet stepping in someone else's urine and then not washing your hands. I just, I tried not to think about it Because I wanted to enjoy the water park and just men are gross. I, men are gross.

AlexYeah.

MattieI got so many weird looks from washing my hands. Yeah.

AlexI mean, exactly. The one I think positive about a women's restroom is often if there is someone who just walks out without washing their hands, like, everyone kind of just turns and doesn't. Well, it's like usually, I don't know. It's like this group. Not, you know what I mean?

MattieWell, you know what? At least they weren't pooping and not washing their hands. So that's something, I guess. I don't touch my dick, so I don't need to wash my hands. No, you do. You pull it out. Anyway, so it was the hardest part of being trans at the water park was not throwing up when I entered the men's restroom.

Alexum honestly then that I think that that means that you had a really good time I you know I I

Mattiedid and if we want to like briefly stay on the topic of like I like I packed when I was swimming because that's what I did at the beach too and that's what made me more comfortable um and it was great it was like I didn't even have to think about it um I'm gonna I'm gonna plug my pack because it's a small trans-owned company, and they're the best, and I didn't even have to think about it. It was just like a pack-in-the-morning-and-go situation,

so it was awesome.

AlexYou mentioned multiple times when we were there that it felt like we were reliving your childhood, and Kara said the same thing, but I could tell that it meant more to you. Like there was like a glistening in your eyes because I don't know. I'd like to hear you actually talk about that because I know that there's like the Peter Pan syndrome thing but I thought it was kind of more than that.

MattieDo you want to explain what Peter Pan syndrome is really briefly for people that don't know?

AlexThat's the thing is there's a lot of debate. What would you call Peter Pan syndrome?

MattieI think for people that transition later in life, it's like reliving, not necessarily, yeah, no, it's like reliving your youth. Like, specifically, I feel like spending your 20s, like your mid-late 20s, experiencing, like, teenagerhood, because you are going through puberty and, like, refinding yourself. So I think it is like being a teenager again, basically.

AlexI mean, I've always kind of like recoiled when someone's like, oh, yeah, they clearly have Peter Pan syndrome. In regards to trans people, just because like nostalgia is not a unique human experience.

MattieBut it doesn't. But see, I take it in a different way where I think it's like that person is figuring themselves out and reliving their youth and just let them have fun. Like don't judge them for being in their 30s like me. Don't judge them for being in their late 30s and enjoying an experience that they couldn't have when they were younger once they feel comfortable. Like that's what it means to me. I think specifically it was pointed out the best when we had the Skylar episode from Queer Eye that we talked about. I related to that definition of Peter Pan syndrome the most. I think sometimes it can be used as a

negative thing but personally I see it as a positive thing. Yeah I don't know I've just heard

Alexit a lot when referring to people's like clothes and stuff and I mean we were far from like the makeup of the water park and not just like parent to kid ratio but just people our age was pretty much 50 50 it's just the volume uh the the the the um audible volume of the children it's definitely

Mattiemore i think there were a lot of people our age but with kids oh see i don't know it's kind of

Alexwell and especially because i was hanging out at like the bars and stuff yeah like there were uh there was like a there was like the dad talk and then oh man you guys are so lucky you're here without kids and there was they were like you know the 40 year old bros who were like yeah uh my wife lets me do this once a year by myself and it was just really it was weirdly wholesome but again yeah it's a phrase that is i i don't even want to say controversial but confusing

because it almost feels infantilizing the way some people talk about it and demeaning whereas Because I think that what you've been doing for the past few years is just doing basic ass stuff that you weren't like it's yeah, I don't know. It's not like you're.

MattieI don't see it as a negative thing. I think we have two different opinions of it.

AlexI think we have two different definitions. But I think there are multiple definitions and this doesn't this could be a whole separate episode.

MattieBut so if we just want to contextualize it for the time being as me reliving my youth, I didn't even think it was something that I needed or wanted to do. And then I real like I used to go to the Dells every summer with my parents from when I was like five until I was like a teenager because, you know, you don't want to hang out with your parents then. Yuck. And it was just such an immersive experience that I haven't done since I was 12.

And so that's 20 years. And it was just like all of the same things like swimming, like playing in the arcade, like getting candy, seeing all the touristy things, just enjoying crappy food and the smell of the chlorine. And it all just brought back so much. Not that I ever had a negative childhood experience there because I don't think I did. But like I didn't realize how much better it would feel to be there in a body I was comfortable in.

To like be in a headspace and just, and I don't know. It was like experiencing those things again for the first time like how I always wanted to. I think maybe what dawned on me is I was a little uncomfortable in like girl swimming suits as I got closer to puberty. And that might have been a reason why I didn't want to keep going anymore. Like, honestly, because, yeah.

AlexYeah. Maybe I sensed that you needed it more than or rather like I sensed why you were excited almost more than you did, because I kind of and I didn't have the opposite experience when I was a kid. But even from the time I can remember, I hated wearing girls swimsuits like it just sucked. And, you know, everybody has a different experience with that. Could have been because I was around, I was the only girl for a decade around a bunch of brothers. But I, I don't know, like I was definitely dreading this, our vacation, because I don't like being in a swimsuit, especially like all day, every day.

But it wasn't too bad because, again, it was a very diverse walk of life or a diverse Midwest walk of life. And no one was really paying attention to what no one's like, I don't know, like hitting on one another like at a lot of adult pool areas.

MattieRight. Everyone's there with their friends, there to get drunk if they're not there to swim. And like you didn't, I was worried you would be really uncomfortable the whole time, but you didn't seem uncomfortable the whole time. Like I can tell usually when you're in your own head about stuff. And I think maybe because I was having so much fun and I was excited to be there. Yep, you got it. And feeling like a big kid. Yep. Then, yeah.

AlexYou called it. Any discomfort I had was basically muted by seeing how happy you were and how much fun you were having.

MattieAnd you actually went swimming too, which you didn't at the beach, but you did at the water park and that made me very happy.

AlexYeah, especially the wave pool, which I know is objectively and chemically disgusting, but I got to experience waves. And I was too afraid to go on most of the water slides, but you were afraid to be in the wave pool and that was adorable.

MattieI wasn't afraid. I just don't like getting like a gallon of water park water in my mouth.

AlexYou closed your mouth. Well, I don't like getting a bunch of water up my nose that previously a person has slid down with their butts.

MattieAnd like they recycle that water.

AlexSame with the wave pool and being in a dark tunnel made of plastic with like screws poking out at the side.

MattieIt's just not very fun. We weren't going to like bust out of the slide. It wasn't broken. And you just didn't like going fast in a tube, which is fine because Kara was there and we had fun on the slides. But I think all this to say is that I didn't realize I needed that experience as an adult. And I definitely did. And it's definitely something I want to do again. But like the first time doing it, I was a little worried and it ended up being amazing.

It like brought back all of these things, but like times 10 in a better way, you know?

AlexThank you so much for sharing that. I had a perfect weekend because I got to experience you being your perfect self. That's very sweet.

MattieAnd we have to do it again once you've had your tea eat. Thank you for listening to this episode of Two Headed Girl. If you would like to support us, you can head on over to patreon.com slash twoheadedgirlfm.

AlexIf you'd like to hear any of our previous episodes, you can go to twoheadedgirl.com. Thanks again, Diles. No. Thanks.

MattieThanks again.

AlexThanks again. Gay.

MattieGay. Gay.

AlexGay.

33. The Most Midwest 0:00 / 00:24:31