Stopping DEI In Its Tracks (Or Lanes)

 I am almost everything the Trump Administration hates.

The reason I say “almost” is that I’m White.  But I check the other boxes:  I am a woman. I am transgender.  I live in New York City. I’ve been voting for Democrats (though I do not identify as one; my values are mostly more progressive). Oh, and I am a cyclist.

Could I be the (or a) reason why the Administration has declared that bike lanes are “DEI tools?”

For those of you who haven’t had to live with the lunacy in the United States, DEI stands for diversity, equity and inclusion. It’s a shorthand for policies created to safeguard against discrimination in workplaces and other institutions.

So how did this Administration—In particular its Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy—come to the conclusion that those green strips of asphalt along your city’s main streets are conduits for people like me, people of color, immigrants and other “undesirables?” Well, Duffy’s predecessor, Pete Bootigieg (whom Duffy referred to as “Boot-edge-edge”) allocated much of the funding made available to municipalities, not only for bike lanes, but also for other projects to improve pedestrian and traffic safety.

You see; “Boot-edge-edge” has a husband and served under Trump’s predecessor, President Joe Biden, who extended and strengthened DEI policies initiated by President Barack Obama, under whom Biden served  as Vice President. “Boot-edge-edge,” said that among other things, building bike lanes and implementing other safety measures would “improve infrastructure, strengthen supply chains, make us safer, advance equity and combat climate change.”

“Advance equity and combat climate change.” Little did he know he was giving his successor ammunition.

Trump and Duffy have sent out messages in screaming capital letters on X (formerly known as Twitter) that their predecessors’ policies were “hostile to motor vehicles” and grants promised to various municipalities—including some that voted overwhelmingly for Trump all three times he ran for President—would be cancelled.

Gotta stop that DEI menace in its tracks, you know!

Photo by Kevin Dietsch, Getty Images 

Midlife Hitchiker?

 Who hitchhikes in midlife?

Well, if you accept that my definition—the one that shapes this blog—anyone who doesn’t know when their life will end and solicits a ride from a stranger is a midlife hitchhiker.

That said, I don’t expect to stand with my thumb out or hold a sign on a roadside. That has nothing to do with age. Or maybe it does: Some things I would have ventured simply don’t seem worth the risks—which may or may not be greater than they were.

I did hitch a couple of rides in my youth, but they weren’t part of my plans, such as they were. Once, a guy who looked like he had whisky and cigarettes for breakfast took me across a bridge where cyclists weren’t allowed and had no walkway. Another time, a fellow with a voice that could’ve leveled the nearby hills gave me a lift into town after I trashed my rear wheel. Both men took me and my bike in pickup trucks that looked like their drivers actually used them on their jobs.

Anyway, I have never taken a hitchhiking trip. I could make the excuse that I was born a few years too late to be a hippie. Or maybe I’m less adventurous than I may have led you to believe I am. 

You could say, perhaps, that I have taken hitchhikers with me, if unintentionally. I’ve found ladybugs—which I don’t see nearly as often as I once did—on my clothes, bags and helmet at the end of a ride. Also, butterflies have landed on me or my handlebars.  Did they want to take a rest ? Oh, and I’ve picked up a puppy and a kitten, which I brought to a police station.

I got to thinking about those “free rides” when I came across this article about another “hitchhiker.” Scientists in Costa Rica found a remora (also known of as a suckerfish) attached to the shell of an olive ridley sea turtle.

What astonished the scientists was not that the remora “hitchiked”: They attach themselves, not only to sea turtles, but also to rays, sharks and whales. But they normally remain on their host as long as it’s swimming because they need to have oxygen from the water flowing over their gills. The scientists, who were observing other aquatic and amphibious life, saw the turtle leave the water for 19 minutes: far longer than they would normally survive without their supply of oxygen.

I wondered where that remora was trying to go. In any event, I imagine it has no idea of when it will die. So, by my definition, it’s a midlife hitchhiker.

(Infrared photo by Megan Bullock for BBC. Remora is near the peak of the turtle’s shell.)

The Cure

 No matter how much money we spend on bikes (or anything related to them), it’s still less than at least one of the alternatives:

Screen and Shade on Midlife Rides

 

Yesterday I pedaled to Point Lookout and back. Today I trekked to Fort Totten. I have done both rides many times. But during the past two days I have noticed—or, perhaps, simply admitted—something.

We’ve had the best weather in weeks: Daytime high temperatures reached 27C (80-81F) after early-morning lows of 17-18C (63-65F). And smoke from Canadian wildfires has cleared, at least for now, and left blue skies full of bright sunshine.

That last quality has become both a blessing and a curse:  It makes me want spend all day riding but, I believe, also tires me out even more than heat. Perhaps my melanin-deficient skin has grown more sensitive in the (ahem) middle of my life.

 When I first started to use sunscreen—some time after I started my gender affirmation (what we used to call “transition”)—I used the least expensive ones I could find. Granted, some store brands have the same formulations as “name” brands. But I wasn’t paying much attention to those ingredient lists or SPF ratings.

That is, until my trip to Cambodia and Laos in 2018. I was much closer to the equator than I’d been before, or have been since. Before I left, someone advised me to get “the strongest” sunscreen I could find.  I brought a tube of 100 SPF lotion with me. It was more stronger than I needed even there and after I returned home, I went back to using the least expensive stuff—usually 30 SPF.

A few years ago, I “upgraded” to 50 SPF. But for rides along the ocean (e.g., much of my ride to Point Lookout) or other large bodies of water, I cover myself with 70 SPF.  Even so, I did something else yesterday and today I never would have imagined in my younger days: I stopped simply to sit in shade for a few minutes—even though I was near the end of each ride. Not so long ago, I would have thought, “I don’t have far to go” and continued to pedal.  

Did I “need” to stop? Even if I didn’t, I don’t regret that I did, any more than I regret using a stronger sunscreen. It just felt good: the same reason I continue to cycle in midlife!

Updates

 

A few quick updates:

My friend Carrie has been making slow progress, but progress nonetheless, on her bike. She’s up to riding a mile. While that may not seem like much, remember that she is only a few years younger than I am and hadn’t ridden in (by her reckoning) at least 25 years.

The trailer that nearly impaled the young man I encountered yesterday is still parked in the same spot, next to the Fordham University campus. I now realize that it’s been there for some time. 

As for the young man: I haven’t heard from him. I hope he’s OK.

Not Even In The Middle Of A Ride

Less than a kilometer from my apartment, I saw a young man sitting hunched-over on the curb. His bike lay beside him. Blood spurted from his left leg.

I stopped and propped my bike against a wall. Fortunately for him, two other women had already stopped to help him. One called for an ambulance; the other gave him a bottle of water and tissues she’d been carrying in her purse. I asked what, I now realize, one or both of those women probably had already asked: How did it happen? Can you move your leg? Did you hit your head? 

Fortunately for him, he answered the last question “no:” He hadn’t worn a helmet. But, he said, after his leg hit something that protruded from a parked construction trailer—and he couldn’t avoid because drivers drove so close—he fell on his side, shoulder-first. He didn’t, however, feel any pain there, and I saw no bruises or scrapes:  just strands of muscle and bone.  I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that he lifts weights.

The woman who called the ambulance was on her way to a meeting and the one with the water and tissues had to pick up her kid.  So I stayed with the young man until the ambulance arrived, and after: I offered words of encouragement as the paramedics checked his legs, took his blood pressure and pulse and did all of those things paramedics do in the situation.  I asked him whether he wanted or needed anything else:  Can I contact someone for him? Could I bring his bike to his place? He said no, and thanked me. So did the paramedics.  But he gave me his number, and I texted him.

Midlife Rock Stars?

On this date in 1969, Apollo 11 landed on the moon. The following day, Neil Armstrong and “Buzz’ Aldrin became the first humans to walk on the lunar surface.

I was a kid, so those days were not like any others I had ever known.  It was the first time that I could recall when, it seemed, the world stopped: regularly-scheduled television programs, baseball games and other events were paused, postponed, canceled or rescheduled. There was nothing else on TV because, really, not many people would have wanted to watch anything else.

Perhaps not surprisingly, Aldrin and Armstrong—and Michael Collins, who remained in orbit around the moon and, arguably, was the most important person in Apollo 11’s success— were given a hero’s welcome. I would go as far as to say the that they attained a status in people’s minds that no one else has before or since.

In one sense, they were like rock stars: They seemed larger than life and so many young people wanted to be like them—or, at least, the image they held of those men. And that image includes one of youth: The fame, fortune and glamor of being a rock star seems attainable because some achieve it in their 20s or even earlier: They aren’t much older than siblings, cousins or, in some cases, aunts or uncles. And in one sense, the astronauts seemed young because they were fit and energetic (and, depending on your perspective, handsome) and represented the future.

The image, of course, differs from the reality. Just almost no young person has any idea of just how much hard work it takes to become a successful musical performer, even if you have Jimi Hendrix’s talent, they don’t know how much intensive training someone has to undergo—sometimes at the cost of marriages and other things in life—to become an astronaut.

Oh, and the astronauts weren’t as young as they might have seemed. Aldrin, Armstrong and Collins were born within a few months of each other in 1930. That would have made them nearly 40 by the time of Apollo 11. While that is not old, I think some would say they were middle-aged. Given Armstrong lived to be 82 and Collins to 90–and that Aldrin is 96–they could all be said to have been, literally, in the middle of their lives when they took that historic flight.

Did that make them midlife rock stars?

Bicycling in (the) Middle Age(s)?

 Bicycling in (the) Middle Age(s)?

Midlife Bikes

 

Yesterday I pedaled Tosca, my Mercian fixed gear bike, to City Island and back. It wasn’t a long ride: about 16 miles (26 km), and only because I took a slightly convoluted route on my way out. But I was happy because I felt good: My body and bike felt as if they were were one, an absolutely perfect form of energy spinning across pavement and dirt.

I have been riding Tosca for nearly two decades, longer than any other bike I’ve ever owned. It was repainted once. I can’t think of anything I’d change on her. I feel the same way about my other bespoke Mercians—Dee-Lilah, my Vincitore Special and La-Vande, my King of Mercia—and Vera, my Miss Mercian mixte.  

Why am I praising my bikes now?  Somehow Infound myself thinking about how, in my youth, I would’ve followed the Tour de France (running now) and other races and wanted to make my bikes more like those Eddy Merckx, Bernard Hinault, Lance Armstrong (before I knew how much he’d cheated) and other champions. Their bikes weren’t very different from the Colnago or Land Shark I rode. But I always felt the need to keep my bike “up to date,” even long after I’d stopped racing or even riding with wannabe racers.

Today I hardly follow racing and am much less interested in professional sports (except for women’s) than I once was. Today I ride only for transportation or pleasure. My bikes serve those purposes; the ones ridden by the pros would not. Integrated cockpits might be great for efficiency, but they don’t allow for adjustment. Disc brakes are more work than I am willing to do; I have not had trouble stopping with caliper brakes as long as I keep them adjusted.  And I don’t need 12 or 13 gears on the rear of my drivetrain.

In other words, the bike I might’ve wanted if I were, today, the young rider I once was has no use or appeal to me as a midlife cyclist.

“Senior Citizens” Should “”Limit” Their Outdoor Activities

 We’ve been warned to limit our outdoor activities if we have chronic medical conditions or are “senior citizens.”

Since I am, ahem, in midlife and know that the definition of “limit” can be, shall we say, elastic, I did go for an early ride.  City Island and back: entirely agreeable—especially on Tosca, my Mercian fixed gear bike—and fits the word “limit,” at least for me.

The island looks like a bit like a New England fishing village. But the thing that reminds you it is, after all, part of New York City (and a tourist trap) are the restaurants and their patrons.  I could smell the fried clams which, somehow, I don’t think New England fishermen eat—and I know weren’t bivalves from local waters. I also noticed the youngish couples who, I assume, were “doing brunch” even if, by most people’s standards, it was breakfast-time.

But, of course, nobody goes to those restaurants for the seafood which is delivered frozen, in trucks, just like the fish and crustaceans one might order anywhere else in the city.  And those restaurants aren’t exactly bargains.  People go to those eateries for the same reason the island is one of my “limit” ride destinations:  the views.

So I will not judge anyone for “doing brunch” at overpriced mediocre restaurants where they could eat exactly the same stuff served on the mainland. I will not judge them, any more than I will judge anyone else riding a bicycle, no matter how decrepit or simply inferior it may be—precisely because I used to judge such riders (some of whom brought their bikes to the island on carriers attached to their cars). It was a lovely morning, and wildfire smoke had yet to shroud the sky.  Let them enjoy it as they will!

Code Orange

 This evening the sun will set at 20:26 (8:26 pm) where I am. 

This was the view from my window two hours earlier:

The cause? Wildfires in Canada, like the ones that blazed our midday skies three years ago.

But remember; Climate change is a Chinese hoax. Dear Leader says so.

(Sarcasm meter: Code Orange.)

What Is Bastille Day To A French Footballer?

 Today is Bastille Day.  The French don’t call it that, just as most Americans don’t refer to the 4th of July as Independence Day.  Instead, in France it’s referred to as “Le Quatorze Juillet” or simply “Le Quatorze”—or “La Fête Naionale.” 

Every year, observers speculate that, perhaps, this time a French cyclist will win the day’s stage of the Tour de France. Perhaps not surprisingly, that didn’t happen: Tadej Pogaćar, who has seemed invincible, took the victory and extended his overall lead.

This year, the French national football team played its semifinal World Cup game against Spain.  As with the Tour de France stage, many fans and observers thought the day would provide a boost of adrenaline that would propel the Gallic players to victory.  That was not to be: the Spanish prevailed 2-0.

In watching that game, I found myself thinking about Frederick Douglass speech, “What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?” While nobody would argue that the French players, most of whom are highly-paid professionals for some of the world’s best teams and leagues, I had to wonder whether at least some of them —who are products of colonialism—aren’t stirred by the day’s celebratory mood.  While France itself may have freed itself from the oppressive ancien regime, its colonial subjects had no more liberty than the people still in bondage in the US when Douglass took the podium.

I do not mean that the French players didn’t give their best effort. Rather, I imagine that it might be as complicated for them to play for a country that exploited their parents and grandparents as it was for Black American soldiers to fight for a country that enslaved their parents and grandparents and denied them the same rights as White soldiers who wore the same uniform.

Perhaps Looks Don’t Matter So Much After All

 This story has nothing to do with cycling and relates only peripherally to midlife.

Recently, I chanced upon “Press Box Chronicles,” a series of YouTube videos by Jeff Pearlman, a self-described “cranky middle-aged sportswriter who’s seen it all.”

A few of his videos cover famous athletes and teams, but they are far from hagiographies. On the other hand, he also talks about sports personalities you may not have hesrd about. Like a true writer, he’s not as interested the team or athlete as the story. And he can tell a story!

Some are funny, like “The Sexiest Man Alive.” He recounts how, during his days as a Sports Illustrated writer, he and some of his colleagues inadvertently helped the folks at People magazine, which shared the same building, pick the wrong person for the “Sexiest Athlete“ for the magazine’s annual “Sexiest Man Alive” issue.

The gist of the story is that the People writers went to their SI counterparts for help in choosing the sexiest athlete. Someone told them “the Kansas City Chiefs’ starting quarterback.” They meant Rich Gannon but, when the People photographer phrased the request that way, someone in the Chiefs’ office sent Elvis Grbac, who was starting that week.

Now, Elvis is a fairly average-looking guy. Gannon, on the other hand, fits most people’s definition of “handsome” quite well.

That story is particularly funny to me because I have a very distant connection to Gannon. He attended the University of Delaware at the same time as one of my brothers. Before she met him, the young woman who would become his wife, and my sister-in-law, knew Rich.  So did some of her female friends.  As good-looking and athletic as he was, none of them (including my sister-in-law) could stand him.

My SIL told me that story one Thanksgiving when Gannon played on a televised game. She even told me some of the unflattering names they had for him.

I wonder what they would have thought of Grbac—and what he would’ve thought about that story.  Would it reassure him that looks aren’t everything and that, perhaps, he really was the Sexiest Athlete Alive in 1998.

In Living Color

 Every cyclist should have a sense of style. Right?

“Lady DUi. Suspect”;Blocks Bike Lane

 Sometimes it’s safer to cycle in a traffic lane than in a bike lane.  Sometimes motorists pass or double-park, and ride-share drivers pick up and discharge passengers in them. I’ve even seen people, including cops, eating, drinking or simply hanging out in vehicles parked in the middle of a lane.

Then there is Genevieve Winston of Deltona, Florida.

The other day, a Sumter County Sheriff’s Office deputy responded to a call about someone driving recklessly and nearly hitting other vehicles before stopping in, and blocking, a bicycle lane.

When the deputy arrived, the white Nissan Rogue’s engine was running and Ms. Winston slumped over the steering wheel. The deputy knocked  on her window. Startled, she tried to hid the Budweiser can from which she’d been drinking.

At first, she refused to exit the car and participate in standard sobriety tests, as ordered.  When she finally stepped out, she staggered and tried to evade the deputy as he handcuffed her.

At the Sumter County Detention Center, her blood alcohol level tested at more than three times the legal limit.  She refused a second test, claiming she couldn’t see the breathalyzer machine.

She was charged with driving under the influence (her third such offense in ten years), refusing to submit to a breathalyzer test and resisting an officer without violence. After being booked, she was released after posting a $7000 bond.

If I had been cycling along that lane, I probably would have been either simply annoyed with her for blocking it or angry that she’d endangered me by forcing me back into traffic. But was it ultimately better that she’d stopped in that lane than if she’d continued to drive? After all, an impaired driver is a menace and danger to everyone—other drivers, cyclists, pedestrians—on the road or crossing it.

As an aside, I have to point out the Villages-News.com headline: “Lady DUI suspect sipping Budweiser beer found parked in bicycle lane.” I recalled how my supervisor on an early job told me his wife was the “first lady professor” in her department at the U.S. Naval Academy. That was in the mid-1980s and said supervisor was, I believe, still living in the 1950s. I can’t remember the last time I heard a female professional referred to as a “lady professor,” “lady doctor” or “lady congressman.” (Yes, I actually heard the latter!) In fact, I almost never hear a woman referred to as “Lady” unless she’s a member of a noble class. Somehow I don’t think that category includes intoxicated drivers. “Lady DUI suspect,” indeed.

What Will We Call It?

 

Someone left a very interesting comment on yesterday’s post. He could recall when automatic transmissions were still a novelty in cars.  Non-automatic transmissions were called ‘standard”—until automatic transmissions became standard. Now they’re called “manual.”

The commenter sees a possible shift (pun intended) in the nomenclature related to two-wheeled vehicles. In my post, I followed the now-standard (!) practic of referring to non-electric, non-motorized bikes as “traditional.” Others probably call them “standard.”  But as they are outsold by e-bikes in many areas, and far more are used in bike-share and -rental schemes, they could, as the commenter points out, become the new “standard “ bike.

If/when that happens, what will we call our “traditional” or “standard” bikes?  The commenter’s wife has a suggestion : “manual.”

I wonder whether John McWhorter rides a bike, with or without a motor, and what he calls it.

Hold Them Accountable

 

When Bicycle Habitat co-founder and proprietor Charlie McCorkle started to use an e-bike, I was glad for him:  He’s a decade older than I am and health issues, including an increasingly arthritic hip, made it difficult for him to mount and ride a traditional bicycle. At least, I thought, he would have a way of getting around and having fun that didn’t involve driving.

And, although some are “cowboys,” I also don’t mind that delivery workers are also on e-bikes. Every one I’ve seen is an immigrant of color (no White South Africans!) and many don’t speak English well or at all. Thus, employment opportunities are limited and, as I understand, delivery workers are paid per delivery (as I, as a bike messenger, was). Also—again, as I’ve heard—delivery apps and customers themselves demand that pizza, sushi, tacos and whatever else arrive within a short window of time.

However, the majority of e-bike riders I see are decades younger than I, Charlie or even the delivery workers are. And too many of them are riding the way many of us did other things when we were their age: recklessly, without any regard for possible consequences, to themselves or others. And I am sure that some realize that they probably will not be held accountable for their mischief and mayhem, like the electric Citibike riders who struck and killed 69-year-old Priscilla Loke and sped away.

Across the Hudson River from where I sit, New Jersey has passed laws setting age limits and requiring registration (including plates) and insurance for e-bikes. While it won’t eliminate reckless riding, it at least makes accountability for injuries, deaths and property damage possible.  One would think that the mayor of my city, Zohran Mamdani (for whom, yes, I voted) would call for similar legislation. Unfortunately, he has done something that, if anything, will only embolden reckless riders: He has ordered the NYPD not to issue summonses to e-bike riders who break the law (e.g., run red lights).

While I am not convinced that more policing always leads to more public safety (and Blacks, LGBTQ people and other communities are over-policed), there are too many examples, such as stores that have closed due to rampant shoplifting, of communities suffering when “minor” offenses aren’t penalized.

I don’t think anybody believes it would be a good idea to tell the police not to ticket drivers who violate traffic laws. While e-bike (and electric scooter) riders aren’t encased in steel, they are as capable of causing serious injury and death to others.  I thus implore the Mayor for whom I voted not to criminalize them, but to hold them accountable.  So far, he has done exactly the opposite.

I Never Thought I’d Do This

 If you’ve been reading some of my recent posts, you know that I am very critical about the history of the country in which I’ve spent most of my life. At least, I have (some would say more-than-) healthy skepticism about the stories we’ve been told, whether in school or elsewhere.

That doesn’t mean, however, that I don’t appreciate what the United States of America offers, or even love much of what makes it unique. I’ll even admit that in international sports competitions, I root for American teams and athletes, especially the women. And, yes, I was as happy as any fellow countryperson (No sexism here!) when Greg LeMond and Lance Armstrong won the Tour de France. At least, I was a fan of Lance and, yes, even wore a Livestrong bracelet (remember that?) until I learned what a cheater and pure-and-simple bully he was.

Yesterday, however, I put my loyalty on pause.  Perhaps it wasn’t entirely fair, as I also found myself rooting against innocent people who worked very hard to achieve what they did.

So what, exactly, was my breach of sports patriotism—or, more accurately, nationalism? I hoped that Belgium’s national football team would beat their Yankee counterparts in their Round of 16 World Cup game.  And I was happy when they did.

Now, I want to make this clear:  I have no more love for Belgium than I have hatred for the United States. I enjoyed my one brief trip through the county, as part of a bicycle tour that took me into northeastern France, southwestern Germany, the Netherlands and Luxembourg. The people treated me well and, for such a small country, it offers a lot historically and culturally. But I don’t imagine that I will ever develop the kind of bond with it that I have even with France, let alone the US.

I also want to make something else clear: I don’t feel the same joy over a Red Devils victory that, under different circumstances, I might’ve felt if the USMNT had won. Rather, I thought, if anything, the outcome was a kind of vindication. 

Folarin Balogun was issued a red card late in the USMNT’s victory over Bosnia-Herzegovina’s national team. I won’t get into whether or not he actually deserved it; that will be a point of debate for some time to come.  He did, however, accept his penalty, which would have meant that he wouldn’t have been allowed to play in the game against Belgium.

The USMNT appealed, as was their right—though, it must be said, such decisions are rarely reversed.  The last word of the previous sentence is the operative one and the current FIFA president, Gianni Infantino, is, shall we say, not seen as an ethical man, which is really saying something in a sports federation that isn’t exactly viewed as a paragon of high moral principles.

So, perhaps, it’s no surprise that he’s a friend of the Fake Tan Führer, a.k.a., the White House Squatter. In a fashion that’s so typical of him, he “influenced “ his compagno to “suspend” the decision for a one-year probationary period.

Perhaps it didn’t matter, at least in sporting terms, as having Balogun in their starting XI wasn’t enough to hold off a team that’s looking for a monumental triumph before its current “golden generation” of players retires. And I feel bad for the rest of the US team, as they won’t be able to enjoy further triumphs on their home turf. (Sports journalists usually say that teams are “going home” when they lose.  Where is the USMNT—or, for that matter, Canada’s or Mexico’s team, who also lost in the Round of 16–going?)

And, more to the point, where is this world going if FTF can bully, not only sports officials, but the rest of the world? That he is the face (literally) my country made me, at least for a day, ashamed to root for something else that represents it.

What Did Your Bike Look Like Yesterday?

 Here’s a 4th of July bike decorating contest unlike any other:

250 And A Long Way To Go

 

Yesterday I wrote about how I remember the summer when I graduated high school: a haze of long, hot days. Today is like one of those days. I took another early morning ride to City Island, where I saw only a couple taking selfies (couplies?) against a marine backdrop.

The summer after I graduated high school, though it seemed to be a procession of days like this one, also happened to be the US Bicentennial.  People seemed to celebrate it more than they’re celebrating this, the 250th. Part of the reason, I believe, is that the president whom I shall not name is trying to make it all about him, as if the signing of the Declaration of Independence wouldn’t have happened without him. While some people follow him like cult members, many more are ashamed that he is the (scowling, glowering, leering) face of this country.  Not many people were crazy about Gerald Ford, the bicentennial president, but I think it had more to do with the circumstances that brought him into the office than his policies (such as they were) or personality.

But I think there is another reason for this year’s less-festive mood.  Perhaps I am projecting my own journey in saying what I am about to say, but here goes:  While the MAGA crowd wants to “return” to a white heterosexual male-dominated Christian (their version, at least) society —as if that ever existed—more of us are aware of the rape, genocide, plunder and other crimes that helped, along with the principles enumerated in the Declaration of Independence and Constitution, to forge this country.  

At the time of the Bicentennial, I only knew of the history I’d been taught and whatever it would enable me to learn on my own. To be fair, that is probably as much as my teachers knew because that is what was taught to them.

Of the 2767 students in my high school, perhaps two dozen were Black and even fewer were Asian, Hispanic or Native American.  And Rutgers, which I would attend after that summer, wasn’t nearly as diverse as it is now. So I had —I was going to say  “fewer opportunities,” but I now realize “less reason” would be more accurate—to question, not only what I had learned, but the perspective from which it had been taught.

So today is for me, as a transgender woman who has friends of races, nations and cultures different from my own—and a cyclist in an auto-centric society—a reminder that there is still a long, long way to go in achieving anything like a fair and just society-and that we still have the tools to accomplish that.