Tired of the Infantilization

Hi,

I am proud to say that I have been masking since March of 2020, give or take a few mistakes where I was misinformed about covid risks (always pay to do your own thorough, unbiased research). I'm a covid-cautious trans nanny who has not had much luck finding covid-cautious families, and in the midst of mask-wearing, particularly now, as so few people are wearing them, I continue to encounter this really bizarre attitude toward me, particularly as of late in the big swarm of parents I see every workday during school pickup and dropoff.

I always mask in large groups even if I'm outside, so every single day I am wearing my mask both in the car on the way to school and back with my kids, and then in line before they go inside or when I pick them up. Without fail, I always get weird looks or almost angry stares, and while some of it is definitely because I'm a visibly queer person, it is very much also because I have a mask on. I am highly othered, parents will largely avoid talking to me, and I get that feeling that someone is jumping to talk sh*t about me the second I'm not in earshot, which feels crazy charged for such a brief period of time. I've noticed that in order to remain committed to the idea of masking being "unnecessary", these parents almost have to become dedicated to their anger and disrespect toward those of us who mask in public, like throwing a pie at the village freak is somehow going to make them immune to my "mind disease" lol. I will say I haven't had a pie thrown at me yet lol, but it all feels very backhanded.

I would feel a million times better if these parents just openly said "yeah I don't care about covid!" instead of acting weird and rude around me because I make an autonomous choice they have failed to make themselves. You have the power to mask, and you're choosing not to, and that has nothing to do with me. You send your kids to school unmasked, you're risking their lives every single day, and now long covid is the number one chronic child illness. A lot of these parents will send their kids to school a) without testing them b) ignoring the lingering symptoms the kids have, like a persistent cough or trouble breathing and c) not even tell kids what covid is (absolutely bizarre). I am tired, tired, tired of having to educate the kids I work with about covid and why I mask, and I'm wholly sick of ignorant parents, spreading their disgusting germs around, creating a base level of ignorance for their kids who don't have the same access to covid info and the actual danger it possesses.

PLEASE mask your children. If you want to play stupid and risk your life, that's your call, but your kids do not have a say and you can't make a choice like that for them. They deserve access to masks, hesitation from participating in large group events during the winter, things that will inevitably lead to them being exposed to covid. It is really hard to be judged every single workday by this group of parents, who have no idea how sad I get sometimes at the thought of how covid ruined my social freedom. I have a big, complex, beautiful life and I am tired of me and my life being demeaned because I wear a mask. I am not a child, and infantilizing me will not reduce the risk of covid hurting you or someone you love. I'm tired of being treated like I'm crazy, when I put so much intention into being covid-cautious, an intention that is interconnected to my personal anti-racist work and social justice support. There's just so much behind it that these people completely fail to see, or they are adamantly refusing to see, and I just wonder how long they think they can keep this up before someone they love gets hurt, and they can't do mental gymnastics to pretend it didn't happen.