Slap! Slap! Slap! And stop carrying your books on your arm like a girl!"
When they let go their grip, I started off on a run, only one boy pursuing and shouting out threats. I shall now reveal the girl-boy's patented secret for getting out of a predicament. I sprinted to the porch of the first house, gave the door-bell several violent jerks, and shrieked for help.
Sixth year: I was absorbed in fashioning a doll's dress. An older sister angrily exclaimed: "Why don't you get out on the ball-field like all other boys? I hate effeminate boys! Mother, I'm afraid Ralph is not normal!"
At the moment I felt ashamed ever to look my disgusted sister in the face again. So ashamed that I wanted to kill myself. (One of my girl-boy playmates, because bitterly persecuted on account of his effeminacy, actually committed suicide at twelve by swallowing rat poison.) "I not normal? What did my sister mean? Could she have had in mind my queer habit of sitting on the boys' laps? I was the only boy that acted so queerly. I had not realized it could be described as 'abnormal.' "
On another occasion, I was, with two brothers, skirting a creek on the way to the swimming-hole. We came to a row of stepping-stones. My brothers trotted across several times. But I lacked the courage even to set foot on the first.
We found several "shavers" in the swimming-hole. My two brothers joined them. But I liked only to recline on the bank and feast my eyes. I would as soon have stripped before boys as would a little girl.
