A Signal--Of What?

 Friday afternoon, I pedaled along the North Shore--into the wind most of the way out, with it on the way back.

On my way back, I stopped in Fort Totten.  As its name implies, it was an active military base.  Now one section of it is used for Army Reserve training exercises; the New York Fire Department uses another.  The rest is a park with some great views of Long Island Sound and, on a clear day, the New York skyline.

When I stopped, I chanced upon this:

I got to thinking, ironically, about a long-ago conversation with an Italian olive grower.  The trees take 100 years to bear fruit, he told me.  So, he said, I am not planting a tree for me, for my children, or their grandchildren.  Rather, he is planting for their grandchildren.

A few weeks after that trip--during which I pedaled from Rome to Avignon and took the TGV (still pretty new then) to Paris--I went to  to see my brother in SoCal, with a stop in NoCal.  I took time from doing all of the things that could have gotten me into trouble (yes, even in San Francisco) to see the millenia-old trees on the other side of the bridge.  Later, I would try to write about how it felt to look at living things--olive, sequoia and other trees--that were older than any other living thing I'd seen, and any civilization or race I'd ever read about.  They were, it seemed, almost as old as the earth itself.

Here in NY, the trees aren't quite that old.  But at least a few have been around for a century or more and have weathered all manner of natural cataclysms and human-made traumas.  But this year proved to be too much for some that fell or broke, like the one in the photo.

Somehow it made the mostly-clear sky even more stark and a harbinger of winter.  Or, could it be a signal to some other direction we (or at least I) cannot yet discern?  Was it directing me to some place I haven't seen or imagined?

I'll spare you any comparisons to the green light in the Great Gatsby!

Good Neighbors Make Good…

 Just as, at my age, I don’t have to be told to slow down, there are many other things no one has to remind me not to do:

From a Reddit thread

How I Could Have Become One Of The Remembered

Today is Transgender Day of Remembrance. All over the world, people will read the names of trans people who have been murdered during the previous year.  Such observances began on this date in 1999, one year after trans woman Rita Hester was found barely alive in her apartment.  She had been stabbed 20 times and died upon arrival at the hospital.

As brutal as her murder was,  it wasn't unusual for trans or non-binary people.  It seems that haters have a particular penchant for spewing their bile on those of us who don't, in one way or another, conform to the norms of whichever sex we were assigned at birth.  And living as the people we are seems to bring out the lawlessness of too many law enforcement officials.

I could have been one of their victims--and, possibly, one of the names read at the commemorations.  One hot day early in my gender-affirmation process, I was riding my Dahon Vitesse home work.  I didn't like the bike much but its flat-black finish garnered a lot of compliments.  One of them came through the window of a van whose rear windows were blacked out.  "Nice bike," the passenger commented.  I nodded in thanks.

The driver slowed that van down.  I rode past and thought nothing of it until it pulled up alongside me again and the same passenger yelled, "Nice legs, honey."  I was wearing a skirt that day and my legs are often complimented, or at least noticed.  So I thought nothing of it until the guy repeated himself, louder, "Nice legs!"  I paid no mind.  Then the guy bellowed, "Stop!"

Of course, I didn't.  But, as it turned out, it was a situation of "damned if I do, damned if I don't."  Again, the van slowed down, let me pull ahead, then caught up to me.  The passenger side flung open.  "When we say STOP, you STOP!"

"Why?"

"We're cops!"

"Show me your badges."

"Shut up!," the driver yelled.  "Shut up and do what we tell you!"

"But if you're a cop, you have to have reason to stop me."

"What were you doing in the projects?"

"First of all, I wasn't there.  I wasn't anywhere near there." That was true which, I think, pissed off those cops even more. "Just shut up and do what we tell you."

At that moment, I was picturing myself in the back of that van and ending up in the river that night.  So, when the passenger demanded to see my ID, I opened my bag. Fortunately for me, the ID I carried had an old address:  I had moved recently and was waiting for my updated state ID card.  

"Where are you going?"

"Home."

"Where's that?"

"The address on the card"--which was a few blocks away.

"OK," hissed the driver. "Just remember--when a cop tells you to do something, you do it," the passenger bellowed.

"You can go now," said the driver.

As it was early in my gender affirmation process, I couldn't help but to think those cops--if they were indeed cops--were "curious" about me.  Or perhaps they were looking for a victim "nobody will miss." 

That incident went down not long after I had gone through a process of wondering whether my cycling would survive my gender affirmation process.  I had made up my mind to continue riding, but I have to admit that I wondered about my decision.

Fortunately, there are more transgender or gender non-conforming cyclists than there were back then, in 2005.  Or, at least, more of us are "out."  I've met a few and have made contact with others, including Molly Cameron and the wonderful Coline in Scotland.  And, of course, there is another Scot:   the incomparable Philippa York, nee Robert Millar, the first anglophone rider to win the polka dot jersey (for the best climber) in the Tour de France.

While cycling has become more inclusive--when I first started became a dedicated rider, nearly half a century ago, almost everyone who rode more than a few kilometers was male--we still need to work toward greater inclusion and safety, of, for and in our own selves.  That is our real journey, however and wherever we ride.