”My New Year Resolution is to the win the school beauty pageant this year!”

That came at the end of several days of not so subtle pressure on me. Not to participate in the pageant but to “man up” and be more assertive and competitive. My family is very competitive. No matter what, they always competed. Sports, academics, work … you name it. My big brother was the school quarterback, my big sister was the girls’ athletics team leader. Since they were twins and seniors they also competed to be the valedictorian. That fight was vicious.

My family’s reaction to this statement was not what I had expected, and had hoped. Well, my sister’s was. She looked disgusted and immediately declared how ridiculous the idea was that a boy could win the beauty pageant. I had not expected my parents and brother to over the moon at the idea. I mean, the idea WAS ridiculous and a bit disgusting. Unfortunately not as ridiculous at you’d think. I had read the rules and while there were a number of rules concerning age, weight and height (my sister didn’t qualify) there was nothing about having to be a girl. Then I was a rather petit boy (NOT petite, I was a boy!) despite coming from a big family. Not a large family, a BIG family. As in 6’4” to 6’8” tall and robust, highly muscled.

Also, I was cute, or pretty, according to many. I was mistaken for a girl more often than I liked. Add to that I liked to have my golden hair rather long and that I was named Penn. NOT Penelope or Pen. PENN, with a double n. My parents, Nelson and Jackie Fisher, were naval history nerds. My big brother was named Anson and my sister Beatty. Not Elisabeth or Betty, Beatty. In my opinion an unusual and cruel punishment. I was named after William Penn. Not the soppy colonizer but the ruthlessly opportunistic admiral. I did not live up to the name. I was “nice”. I had also given up trying to compete, hence the argument over Christmas.

I was short, small and skinny. That made competing in anything physical rather meaningless. I understand that I was too short to play basketball or volleyball but too short for baseball? And to be a scout? I gave up. I also gave up competing in class. No matter how hard I tried to equal my siblings at my age, I came up short, so why bother? Oh, I was intelligent enough, just not AS intelligent and competitive. I learned a lot but had stopped trying to show it since I’d fall short anyway. I had no wish to compete. I was like Ferdinand the bull, content to sit under my cork oak and smell the flowers, which actually isn’t such a bad deal when you consider the alternative.

Now my family finally had gotten what they wanted. They had made me angry and had made me commit to a competition. No matter what the competition, now they’d make sure I won. Well, with the exception of my sister, who refused to be an accomplice in my vice. Otherwise the family consensus was that I needed to really get into the skin of being a girl in order to win the pageant. Not just don a dress on the day. Body language, demeanor and all that were of equal importance. So, what I needed was full immersion. NOT what I had intended. Backing out was not an option. When a member of a highly competitive family – don’t even THINK about quitting.

The family member that did most was, surprisingly, my brother. No, he wasn’t a crossdresser but he had had several girlfriends and knew quite a lot about girls. For example where they went to get better clothes than those available at the mall. There was a small boutique where the most fashionable girls went to get their stuff. That’s where we headed off to on January second. I have to give it to the salesgirl. She hardly batted an eye when my brother told her his little brother needed a completely new wardrobe. She gave some advice but it turned out that my brother has an excellent eye for fashion and what suits a specific girl, or in my case a girly boy. As I was showing off the last, rather short, dress a gaggle of cheerleaders entered the shop. I was not prepared to be “outed” yet. Oh, I knew it was coming but I had expected to get used to the whole thing first. The head cheerleader (and, of course, my brother’s girlfriend) looked at me and squealed in delight. To make a short story shorter I ended up getting adopted as the cheerleading squad’s pet and pet project.

My father arranged things with school. I was to be allowed to present as a girl and participate in girls’ PE. But not use the girls’ locker room. As things turned out that was not such a big problem since the cheerleaders insisted that I train with them (counted as PE) and thus I was in the boys’ locker room at the same time as the football team. Counterintuitive? Remember that my big brother was the QB.

The first day of Spring semester was also the day that registration for the “Anna Tromp Memorial Beauty Pageant” opened. The pageant was considered to be the school pageant but formally it was arranged by a foundation, that also provided the generous prize. My chemistry teacher, Ms Tromp (grand-daughter), was not amused and tried to refuse me. A piece of advice: Don’t ever get into a legal argument with my DA mother. She WINS. The rules were amended afterwards but since I already was in ….

Then the new normal began. Some were angry at me for presenting as a girl. Some thought I committed a deadly sin and was headed straight for hell. Most thought it was a bit funny and then forgot about it. Some approved. Some helped me. This applied to both students and teachers. Mary, the Principal’s daughter became my new BFF. I liked that since the was shorter than I. The ONLY student in our class that was. She was also one of my competitors in the pageant. That didn’t stop her from helping me with make-up and things like that (not exactly something the either my mother or sister was proficient at, surprisingly). Mary was just as competitive as my family but had this strange idea that she’d win on her own merits and not by keeping the competition down.

The cheerleaders were great. I trained with them. It was grueling at first since I had led my body go a bit. I was seduced by their camaraderie. That the team meant all and all individual efforts was for the team. I also participated in their weekly Saturday sleepovers. Surprised? Well, they regarded me as their little sister, The sleepovers did help me getting more girly, or as I preferred to say, graceful. Then there was another aspect of the sleepovers. Study! The girls were very serious about their studies so most of the day was devoted to mutual study help. Since I was the only freshman there, they already knew the stuff I was studying – and they brooked no slackness.

Another thing I had to thank the squad for was ballet. They insisted that I take ballet with them. They even insisted that I take the same class as them despite being a beginner. I loved it so I took more, and more appropriate, classes a well. It was my ballet teacher who changed my name as well. She misheard and called me Penny. Penny, I remained in class and eventually in school. It was more or less inevitable, wasn’t it. Once more I changed with the boys, more specifically with the football team. I hadn’t known that many of them took ballet to improve their skills. Not all of them. Not my brother for an example. He had started with the rest of them but had quit later. My brother had QUIT something?! He later admitted that he was no good at ballet and when the rest of the team had advanced to a higher level but he didn’t, he couldn’t take it so he quit.

Despite that, the biggest surprise was Pippa, the one girl on the football team. She was big and muscular and, in my eyes, without doubt the most graceful in ballet class. We became good friends. We became very good friends. We became more than very good friends. Oh, people had great fun at our relationship. The big muscular Junior football player girl and the cute petite (I had stopped bothering about that) beauty pageant freshman cheerleader boy. Cheerleader boy? Yeah, I had become a formal member of the squad when one of the girls moved to another state. Since I had done surprisingly well training with the squad I had been formally included and not only as their pet. However, I wasn’t the heir but only the spare. The former replacement moved up. Yet, as a replacement I still was a member of the squad. My parents and brother were happy. Very happy. My sister less so.

Beatty even tried to sabotage me. She wasn’t very good at it and my parents came down as a metric ton of bricks on her. She later confessed that she did it because she was jealous of me. Jealous? Of me? She had desperately wanted to be a cheerleader and had signed up for cheerleader tryouts as a sophomore. Then she had got cold feet just before going out there to do her try-out routine. She was too scared. She was afraid of being an object of ridicule. The VERY BIG girl wanting to be a cheerleader. Then I had become a cheerleader, more of less sliding in on a banana peel. And even worse, the ridicule didn’t bother me. That wasn’t really true but I didn’t tell her that. It did bother me but by then there were definitely more ups than downs with the whole thing. Cheerleading, ballet, academic success and Pippa. Especially Pippa. I liked the feeling of being secure when she hugged me. I didn’t really NEED it but it sure felt good. I was good for Pippa as well. Before me she had been a rather lonesome girl. The only girl on the football team. Not one of girls, but not really one of the boys on the team either. Pippa had had a standing invitation to the cheerleading sleepovers but hadn’t felt comfortable attending. That is before I came around. Now she had not only a boyfriend but also a gaggle of friends.

Did I mention academics? I wasn’t ashamed of showing what I could do any longer, even if not as good as my siblings. Then there were the Saturday sleepovers. However, there’s nothing as helpful as a really good enemy. Yes, I had got myself a fully-fledged enemy – my chemistry teacher Ms Tromp. She really motivated me to be better at Chemistry. At the beginning of the semester my chemistry grades dived. I didn’t understand why at first but then I realized how much she hated me for degrading “her” pageant. I showed a test paper that I had got an F on to my father. He didn’t think it looked right so he had colleague of his at the university (my father is a full professor in Public Administration) look at it. It came back as a B- according to that rather exacting chemistry professor. Father had a chat with the Principal (my BFF’s father). After that Ms Tromp hated me with a vengeance but graded me meticulously. To add to her hate of me I placed 20th in a national chemistry contest for high school students. The best any of her students had ever placed and much better than either of my siblings. That was unforgivable! However, by then I had learned how to handle her. If someone named after William Penn couldn’t handle a Tromp, who could? I was wrong of course.

The end of the semester and the day of the pageant grew ever closer. The heavy betting was on me as the winner. I had really become quite the lady over the semester. I was cute, I was beautiful, I had an exquisite demeanor, almost regal, and I was popular. The only one who had odds nearly as low as mine were my BFF Mary. The rumor was that even the Principal had betted against his own daughter. Through an intermediary, of course. Otherwise, he was a bit disappointed that Mary hadn’t become my girlfriend. I was the only one that didn’t make his daughter look too short.

As we were putting the final touches before the pageant, both Mary and I had stunning dresses, Ms Tromp arrived with a notary public in tow and proceeded to measure me. It turned out that I was a quarter of an inch too short according to the rules. Had they done that in the morning I’d have been fine (you shrink slightly during the day), had they done that earlier I could have appealed but now I was out of the contest. It certainly didn’t help that the notary public just looked at Mary and noted: She’s out too. Misery doesn’t necessarily love company. Though the horrified look on Ms Tromp’s face when realizing she’d disqualified the Prinicpal’s daughter (and the schoolboard president’s goddaughter), even if only by mistake, DID help. Still I, I couldn’t escape my life’s STORY: TOO SHORT!

Then Pippa enfolded me in her strong reassuring arms and declared:
“Emergency sleepover tonight. Every cheerleader and football player, be there”.

As every single cheerleader and football player as well as many others left the auditorium it struck me. Not winning didn’t matter to me. Actually, the contest as such didn’t matter. Goals are heavily overrated. I had found and gained so much more than a plain, run of the mill victory could ever give me. What had made me and my life so much better was the Journey!