This is my dilemma.

The project is cancelled. It was basically going to be a big musical coming-out-to-my-family thing. But not quite how it sounds. I need to explain.

There are lots more things my family don't know about me, things that aren't gender, things that shouldn't even be hidden. The “some kind of identity” I found and kept secret was Helen Trevillion's music.
Ok this is a clusterfuck of things needing explanation.

I'm still not sure why, but when I was younger I was really afraid of appearing feminine. I guess it could be because of my transphobic dad, who I think was kind of obsessed with the idea of being a Man (with a capital M). I've written about his childishness before, and all I really need to say here is that I'm pretty sure he's mentally still a teenager, and has been most of his life. (I'm not on such bad grounds with him these days. I don't see him very often though. Which I'm fine with. I wonder what would happen if I came out as trans... Provided I actually am, of course.) But I'm pretty sure it was other people too. My guess is that I was made fun of every time I did anything that might be feminine, so I did my best to avoid it. For years I was afraid of talking to girls, talking about girls, and even saying female pronouns or the word “girl”. It wasn't the only thing though. My self was still crumbling on the inside, and I didn't even know it was happening.

It's in this context that I discovered Helen's music. I'd never really felt allowed to judge female artists myself before, but I was listening to this on my own so I had no other opinions to fall back on; it had to be mine. Needless to say I became a fan.

But this couldn't be let out. Me? Liking a female artist? I had to hide this. I think I knew I couldn't know how people would react, but the past indicated ridicule, and I couldn't afford that, not after I'd just spent the bulk of fifteen years falling away inside. Especially not after it'd only just stopped.

That's what the project was. I was going to “come out” about my real music tastes. And I needed to do it in this way, because I need them to know how big of a deal this is to me. The rebuilding and development of my identity started with discovering Helen Trevillion. Her music and words are central to what makes me me, in the present day (granted, there're now plenty of things that make me me in the present day).

But it doesn't feel right. Every time I think about working on it, I decide not to. The project just doesn't feel like something I want to do. I know I'll have to tell them somehow eventually, I know I can't stay this repressed, but I don't want to do it like this, for some reason. It feels like a huge undertaking, so I can't just plain tell them, and I don't want to have a long and painful conversation about my past with them, mostly because they're often antagonists in the story of my past, and I don't want to burn any bridges, especially not while I'm still living here.