On a 90-degree day in July, I was lugging a pelican case through a New York City park. Inside the case was a Sony Fs5, a professional video camera that shoots super-HD video and costs almost $5,000. Today I had high quality lenses, microphones, all the bells and whistles I needed to shoot a video. I was excited and in a great mood, even if sweat was running down my back.

Just as I was putting the camera on a monopod—essentially a fancy stick that keeps the camera stable—a pair of hands came into my field of vision, grabbing the camera and gripping the pole. I whirled around in a panic, and saw a man wearing sunglasses with his own photo camera draped over his shoulder. Click: The camera was on the monopod.

At first I was relieved. He hadn’t been trying to rob me; he was just trying to help. But then I got pissed. Who does this guy think he is? I couldn’t stop thinking about the countless times I’ve watched strangers chat up my male colleagues about their equipment, never once putting their hands on their gear. Why is it that people always seem to do this kind of thing to me, and not my male peers?

I tried to move on and get back into my good mood, but then he asked, “Are you a student?”

And then I got really fucking angry.

I get why you might think I was overreacting, but when you’re faced with this scenario over and over again, it gets pretty old. I realize it was not this guy’s intention to belittle me, but I can’t help but feel that interactions like these are gendered. The default reaction of people who see me—usually men, but sometimes women—is to assume that I’m an amateur. Sure, it’s insulting, but after you have your competence questioned by strangers so many times, you start to wonder if they’re right. It’s a shitty feeling—having to fight for the space I already occupy. And I’m not alone.

As a woman who operates a camera—who executes a vision with a lens—I’m a rarity. This year, 2018, is the first time a woman has ever been nominated for the Academy Award for cinematography: Rachel Morrison for Mudbound. A female director has taken home an Oscar just once: Kathryn Bigelow for The Hurt Locker in 2010. And according to the Center for the Study of Women in Television and Film, of the top 100 grossing films of 2017, only 8 percent were directed by women, 10 percent written by women, 24 percent produced by women, and 14 percent edited by women.

Women in film, television, and digital video (me) can understandably feel like the odds are stacked against us.

I can’t remember a time in my life where I didn’t want to be a filmmaker. I was directing my three-year-old brother in fake commercials for a used car dealership when I was five. In high school, I convinced my teachers that a video was a great substitute for an essay. And in college, all I wanted to do was study film.

In school, I was never in a screenwriting class with more than two other women. In lighting workshops, boys elbowed their way past the girls to reach the kits first. On the first group film project we were assigned, I was relegated to organizing pre-production by the male director and camera operator. I didn’t want to be difficult to work with, so I kept my mouth closed and did my job.