Special Women's Issue
Volume 2, Number 4, Issue 8
Amsterdam, Winter 1992
Sjuul Deckwitz interviewed Inge, a 18-year-old high-school student who, after high-school graduation, wants to go abroad for a year and then do Dutch studies at university. She lives with her father, but leads an independent life. Her parents are divorced and she has a good relationship with her mother and brother. When she was 16 she fell in love with Martina, then 32, a teacher in her school. Their relationship lasted two years, although the relationship only became sexual during the second year. According to Inge the age difference was a contributing, but not the primary, cause for their break-up.
Inge: When I was twelve and in the sixth grade, I fell in love with "Ellen," an older woman, my gym teacher. I don't know exactly how old she was, but in any case she was much older than I. During gym class I was really scared of blundering, and I hardly dared to look at her. Perhaps that's why I can't quite remember her face. I have retained more the image of her charisma. She was a very athletic and self-confident woman. I simply didn't think about the age difference.
I was brought up in a very liberal environment. It was quite normal to discuss and assert your feelings and desires in my family. I didn't have to hide them from my parents, or friends. I discussed my infatuation quite frankly with my mother, but mentioned it only in passing to my dad.
I finally decided to write my gym teacher a letter. In the end I didn't send it, though I did keep it.
Dear Ellen: It's very hard for me to write about this, but I'll do it anyway. For a long time I felt I've been in love with you. I have spent hours thinking about how to tell you this. Eventually I decided to tell you in a letter. I have discussed this with many people, but now I would like to know how you feel about it. Could you write me back about this? I would very much like an answer.
Soon after I entered junior high school, on an impulse, I wrote a little article for the school paper about my crush on the gym teacher. I wanted to know how other kids were reacting.
Being in love! I myself was in love with a teacher. It was my first time. It's great to be in love, but it can also be difficult. When I was in love I told my mother and two girlfriends - that it was with a woman, and I am a girl. They encouraged me to tell my teacher. After thinking it over for a long time, I decided to write her a letter. After wavering for a long time I decided, however, not to send it.In the last week of sixth grade I finally decided I had to tell her.
She came into our classroom to ask our teacher about something or other and left again right away. I saw her and thought, "This is my last chance. I have to tell her." I ran after her and asked her if she had a moment to spare. I started to tremble, my cheeks flushed, and I got all tearful. I stumbled over my words. She asked me whether I felt relieved, and some other things, but I can't remember now what they were. Then it was all over. I went back to my class, my cheeks still tear-stained, and went on with my lessons. I would like to hear or read more stories like mine: whether other people told the one they were in love with, whether they also fell in love with somebody their own sex, how the people they told about it reacted. I'm really curious.
Fortunately for me, my girlfriends from my primary-school days kept it a secret. The word got around, nonetheless, that I was the one who had written the article. They really pestered me about it. They had always thought I was odd because I had rather feminist ideas; I was more progressive than most of the others, and I didn't wear all the latest things popular with the kids. They really teased me. Little by little they started to forget, but I never really felt comfortable there. After three years I transferred to another school. When I was in high school I realized for the first time how strange people thought homosexuality was.
At the new school I met a girl who was preparing a paper about homosexuality in the United States. I felt I could confide in her, and told her what had happened at my previous school. She asked me if I wanted to go out with her to a women's disco, the Labyrinth. It was the last night it was going to be open before they closed down for good. There was a huge, last-night party. I liked it there, I felt at ease. My friend told me she expected Martina, a teacher at our high school, to be there later, and from that moment on I was on pins and needles. Would she come? Wouldn't she? I had seen her around school and run into her a few times but I hadn't realized that I was already in love with her. Finally she arrived and right away, WHAM! It seemed to be love at first sight, but these feelings had already been brewing unconsciously in me. Right there, in the thick of all the party hubbub, we talked all night.
Martina was 32 years old, I was 16. Although we were in love, she didn't want a sexual relationship with me. She was very clear about this. As long as she was teaching at our school, nothing could happen between us. If the two of us were going to enter into a relationship, she wanted to be open about it. She didn't have a permanent position, and she worried that people at the school would have trouble with her homosexuality. She didn't cherish being branded a paedophile either; a lesbian with a young partner would be doubly odd and doubly negative. We went out sometimes to a bar or a restaurant, but more often we stayed at her place, sitting at opposite ends of the couch, longing for one another. I remember thinking, "I want to, I want to." It was all very hard, but exciting at the same time. I thought she was very beautiful, and because she was a teacher I put her on a pedestal. We could talk so well together, about feminism for instance, or politics, or being a lesbian. She taught me how to reason, and through our conversations I began to understand how society was structured, something I had never realized before.
Her refusal to have a relationship was hard for me, but I trusted her saying it was impossible for her. I wanted to be as close to her as possible and was afraid of losing her by making the mistake of pressuring her into anything. This lasted for about a year, but then she got another job. If she hadn't changed jobs I might have become more insistent.
She phoned me one day not long afterwards, and we had this very intense discussion on the phone. I was floored. I hadn't expected things to ever change between us. I really had to catch my breath. We arranged a date. We were both very much in love, and there was no longer any reason to deny ourselves. Our relationship really began when we started to make love.
My parents didn't mind that I now had this full-blown relationship with a woman, and a much older woman at that. They were pleased for me, and showed interest in its development. My brother was fairly quick to accept it, though at first he had some difficulties with the fact that I am a lesbian. Most of my friends reacted positively, but I felt I still had to hide it from my other acquaintances whom I knew simply would never understand it. At school I only told a few girlfriends I trusted. I didn't have the nerve to walk hand in hand with her in the streets. Perhaps, with someone my own age, it wouldn't have bothered me.
When we went shopping, people sometimes thought we were cousins. Once, when we were in a women's bookshop, somebody asked us whether we attended the same school. Sure, the two of us thought, but not the way you think!
We met three times a week and I slept over at Martina's. We spent almost the whole weekend together. I was terribly in love, completely focussed on her. My friends complained that they could never reach me at home, but they understood that I was simply in love.
Right from the beginning, Martina said that she knew how it was going to end. When you get into a relationship at an early age there will always come a time when you start looking for someone else. I heard her saying it, but I didn't really take it in. I was too much in love.
There certainly were problems. I was living with my father and there was this third person to deal with, so there was less privacy. Martina and my dad got along very well and we tried sleeping together at my place. The three of us ate dinner together too, but this didn't really work, and we ended up mostly at Martina's.
You have to remember that I was still at school, living at home, and had little of my own money to spend. We didn't share all the same tastes either. We both enjoyed the theater and the movies, but Martina preferred dances for women over thirty. We saw a lot more of Martina's friends than of mine, and I didn't make my own friends at those dances. I didn't know the music and just stood around feeling self-conscious. Sometimes I got drawn into conversations that went over my head simply because those women lived in a different world. They talked about their jobs, literature, or politics, and sometimes used expressions I didn't understand. At moments like that I didn't feel I could ask what they meant.
Her friends were kind to me, maybe unconsciously a little condescending: whenever they talked with me they always asked me about school. That really made me feel different, so young. I realized that I wanted to be more in touch with my peers, that I wanted to fool around and just have some good old fashioned fun. Sometimes I went to the girls' group, for the under 26, at the local gay and lesbian center.
Martana was too old to join me there, but I did take her along to parties. I was proud to show her off. But I felt so terribly responsible; I always watched carefully to see if she was having a good time. On several occasions we talked about my not seeing enough of my girlfriends. Sometimes I felt our relationship cramped my style. I wanted to feel free; to flirt; to have one night stands; to try out everything. It all had to do with being young.
After the relationship had ended, Martina said that we should have spent more time at my place, in my world. She also said that it would have made a big difference if I had been living on my own because I hadn't liked it when she had had to pay for me. Of course I had sometimes paid for myself, but whenever we did something expensive, she paid. It's great to go to the theater, but I also thought: why not skip this time, it's so expensive, and then on the other hand I thought: why not make use of the money that's available? I offered to pay her something monthly to help cover my share of the expenses, but she didn't want me to. She always paid for the groceries. Ironically, she told me that she should have paid more often for me. She thought I spent too much money on the two of us. Martina was very much aware of my situation, because she herself had had a relationship with an older woman when she was young.
Sexually, I didn't experience the age difference. I had already had sexual experiences with girls my own age and knew what I liked and didn't like. When I was about 13 years old, I had a girl friend who was, just like me, preoccupied with sex. We bought porn and cut up old pantyhose into erotic lingerie. When you can't afford to buy that stuff you've got to do it yourself. I experimented with her and other girls. I even practiced kissing because I was afraid that I wouldn't be good at it. I had read somewhere that you should practice on your hand. I practiced every night. When it came to sex I was pretty well prepared, though I think that with every new relationship you have to start all over again. You always feel a bit insecure at first. When someone is ready for sex they look for it. It's probably better if they have some kind of a basis, experience with their peers. That way they can find out what they want. Most kids know very well what they want. When it comes to sex, they sense when something is not quite right. They'll withdraw. Certainly, kids in relationships with older persons, and who are not yet so sure of themselves, can be manipulated. But uncertainty and manipulation can be a part of any relationship.
At present I have a relationship with a woman eight years older than I, so there isn't that much of an age gap. Maybe, as I grow older, I'll take more and more to people my own age. I do notice that she's younger than Martina. We like the same kinds of entertainment; it's just great, having fin and making love. I think equality is very important; to listen to each other, to help one another, to appreciate each other. But I can still imagine myself in a relationship with somebody in their thirties or forties. I haven't yet fallen in love with somebody my own age. You can never know, it could happen any time.
My mother asked me once why I didn't look for somebody my own age. I took it as a criticism, as if she were warning me that I made it too hard for myself. She didn't want to see me hurt, especially because of differences in age. Now I realize I can have very satisfying conversations with my peers. I also really like to live it up.
The age difference wasn't the primary cause of our splitting up, though I'd have to say it did contribute to it. My being all wrapped up in her life finally began to bother me, and all of a sudden I put an end to our relationship. It seemed sudden of course, but I had been nursing these feelings for some time, and she had felt it coming.
When I look around me I notice that age differences are pretty common in the lesbian world. I don't want to label something, "the lesbian world," as if it were as a place where these relationships happen a lot, but girls look up to an older woman as an example, and the older woman helps the girl's coming out. If I could relive my relationship with Martina, I wouldn't hesitate for one second. I look back on it now with great pleasure.