Male? Female? Not me.

Transgender? Trans-gender? Trans-what? Okay. Let's break this down, so that the next time we meet, we won't have to spend a half-hour over an 800-calorie coffee drink dissecting the particulars of language and the politics of just trying to get through the day. "Trans" means "across" or "over" or "beyond" — think transnational railroad. As for "gender" — that's a bit trickier. Entire books have been written on the meaning of "gender" (and probably on the meaning of transnational railroads); there's nothing hotter in the academic world today. Add the word "gender" into your dissertation proposal and the committee starts salivating: how progressive, how hip, how ... now. "Gender" is the buzzword that'll sell your final essay in any anthropology or literature class, but use it with caution. Gender, gender ... what? And where do sex and sexuality come in?

To me, sex is the Google Map, and gender is the 2 a.m. knuckles on the steering wheel, ripping up the so-called directions while lost in the middle of Iowa with no satellite navigation system to look to for salvation. Gender is the expression of something writ (or typed). Gender is the process of living in the moment and interacting with others. Gender is going to bed naked and making yourself something new every day.

But gender isn't about deciding, no matter what the drag queens tell you. Unfortunately, I can't just get up in the morning and forcefully determine that I'm a butch dyke. (Though that would be nice.) Society has a say, too. What other people think your gender is determines your gender. Strapping on a six-inch purple dildo doesn't automatically mean you strap on a gender. It's not that easy. No, gender comes from forces we can't even describe — little pockets of power that pop up in places we don't want to think about. Gender is seeing your brother naked and not liking it. Gender is getting hot for a teacher in that Van Halen way. Gender is bringing yourself to orgasm while thinking about things that surprise you. Gender is the way you slap your fraternity brother's ass or kiss other girls when you're drunk. Gender is the way you hold your hands, the way you walk to class. Gender is your major and whether or not you want to get married — or if you're able to get married. Gender is the legal system, the educational system, the social system and those little boxes that you check on college applications, tax papers and facebook.com profiles. Gender is omnipresent and so profoundly embedded in our society that we can't even begin to describe it.

Indescribable? Is that honestly what gender is? No wonder "we" struggle! (I put the "we" in quotation marks because the politics of coalition-making are often complex and dirtier than a leather daddy on the Lower East Side.) I, for one — I struggle. I struggle every day, because I have no idea what my gender is. I don't know if I even have a gender. I think I do, because I think that everyone has a gender. Or two. Or more. I don't know if I can have more than one gender at one time, if I can pile them on like Mardi Gras beads or if gender is fixed and immobile like Madonna's bra. Right now, at this moment, I identify my gender as a radical feminist Jewish Midwestern Daddy-loving eyeshadow-wearing non-shaving (of certain body parts) egg-eating hipster-worshipping Sharon Olds-loving poetry-scribblin' film-making Woody Allen-lusting genderqueer transgender drag-queen butch-dyke non-female, non-male, non-third or fourth or fifth gender student. Phew. I'm already out of breath! And this list, this "gender," well — it's not a list that I carry around in my handbag (it's not a purse, because that's too feminine). Why? This list changes. It might change in a few minutes. Or tomorrow morning. Or the next time I get dressed, or kiss somebody, or think about who I am and what I'm doing.

This gender ambiguity is incredibly difficult to live with day-today. It's hard to think about these things, because these things are things that most people take for granted. "Please indicate your gender in the box." It's either "Male? Check here." Or "Female? Check here." Not for me, and not for a lot of students who are struggling with the same issues. These students are on this campus, and not only in the places you'd expect. Yes, they — or we — are in the LGBT (Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender) Center on the second level of Frist Campus Center. Yes, we're at the Drag Ball at Terrace Club. Yes, we're taking the Dinky to New York to queer clubs and gay bars in SoHo. But we're also in classes like "Practical Ethics" and "Calculus I" and the Humanities Sequence and Chinese 101. We're here, and we're queer. We're everywhere.

We're also nowhere. Why? There's not much of a "we" here. There's not a concentrated group of people in "the community," because there's not one community. At Princeton, there are several queer communities: The ones that write proposals to build a Center (as some fondly call that meeting space in Frist); the ones that meet "underground" and anonymously Friday and Saturday nights; the ones that meet publicly for lunches with the Women's Center and the International Center; the ones that meet in Firestone Library for seminars; the ones that meet online for cam sex; the ones that meet in dorm rooms for casual gay hookups; the ones that work with administrators to get genderqueer/non-gender bathrooms in public places; the ones that work with faculty to form gender progressive curricula, the ones that get the hell out of Princeton; and the ones that don't identify themselves as communities, but are just people who are frustrated with the gender dichotomy, this male vs. female, this put-me-in-a-literal-box and then forget about me as a human being all together.

I'm in most of those communities. Join one. Join us. Because the "us" is always changing. Jean/Gene Beebe is a sophomore from Clive, Iowa and the founder and executive director of Moving ForWords Productions, a gender-progressive production company. Jean/Gene can be reached at jbeebe@princeton.edu.