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Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/q/10679
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

This is the opening of a short story I'm writing:

> 1996 was the year I became obsessed with animal suicide. I guess you can say it became my reason to live—the sun in my sky, the very air I breathed. I talked about it the all the time: at home, at college, at parties, even at family reunions. So I wasn't surprised when people decided to keep a distance from me. I didn't blame them, though. No one wants to picture a drowning cat while enjoying a meal.
> 
> This new found passion also interfered with my dating life. It turns out animal suicide isn't the best topic for a romantic dinner.
> 
> "Animal suicide?" The guy I was dating stared at me across the table as though I had brought him some bad news. "That's what your research is about?"
> 
> "Well, it's more like a side project," I explained. "It's so interesting! Now I'm reading about thirty cows that threw themselves mysteriously off of a cliff. No one knows the reason, not even the person who wrote the article. Strange, isn't? What kind of existential crisis could lead cows to do that?"
> 
> The guy never called again. Too bad. I was beginning to like him.

I though the gender of the narrator would become apparent after the dinner part. But someone told me he couldn't figure out.

Should I make the gender of the narrator more obvious? If so, how?

Original score: 0