Going in Drag Again

Midway through my Friday evening at home, it struck me that I need to get my car to my mechanic for the annual state inspection so I can renew my license plate. Fortunately, my mechanic is only two blocks away. Since I have no need for my car tomorrow morning, it occurred to me I could take the car to the garage tonight, place my keys in the drop box, and let them do the inspection tomorrow morning while I putter around the house. A good plan.

There was just one problem. I’d need to walk home after leaving the car at the mechanic’s. It’s dark by this time of night. The mechanic is only two blocks away, but I’m in a transitional neighborhood. I have many good neighbors. It’s a designated historic district. There’s a big church across the street. But the cops are also making a lot of busts within a block of my home. Some houses often have fights in their front yards, and some people keep their pit bulls staked out in those front yards. The police are nearby very often. And my mechanic’s shop is next to a gas/convenience store that is a magnet for thugs.

Since it was 9 p.m. by the time I had my bright idea of taking the car to the mechanic and walking home, I found myself strangely cautious. I took off my jewelry. I emptied my pockets of everything but my driver’s license, ancient cell phone, and house key. And I put on my burly parka since the temperature here is now into the 40s and it would give me cover.

It all went fine. I’m home safely. When I left the car at the garage, I adopted my “don’t mess with me walk,” putting some attitude along with my 5’10” height and slender build under the parka.
But in the midst of all this, I suddenly remembered an old memory and another time when I felt unsafe.

The Old Memory
I was just a young teenager, in the small Southern town of my birth, walking down Main Street. An adult I didn’t know stopped me, engaged me in conversation, and asked me if I was [using my father’s name] his daughter. I said I was. He said he guessed I was because of my walk.  Apparently, I walk like my dad. I don’t know why. But I never did learn the “girly walk.”  I have no idea how women make their hips get into the action when they walk. It’s a mystery to me.

The Scary Memory
During college in Dallas during the 1970s, I was very close to a family who had a ranch 100 miles west. They weren’t there often, but I could go there as often as I wished and have the place to myself. They also let me use their old Jeep for the travels. I drove out there often to escape the city. I went there one weekend and found a “snippy” note they had left. As I learned later, it wasn’t meant for me, but I took it personally.  I left the Jeep there and determined to get back to college on my own. What did that mean?  Of course, it meant hitchhiking 100 miles back to my Dallas campus.

Even then, hitchhiking wasn’t exactly safe. I remember donning my jeans, flannel shirt, Levi jacket, cowboy boots, and hat, and walking the two miles out to the highway.  I didn’t have to walk along that highway too long before a car pulled over, offering me a ride. Three guys were in it – “good ol’ boys” about my age.  They asked my name. I pretended to be a boy, said my name was “Len,” and got in the back seat, thinking I’d be safe if I could just be one of them.

It was interesting to ride with them. They were drinking and toking, and I was the one not drinking or toking. I remember how they responded to “babes” they passed on the road. I’ll just say their responses were genital and leave it at that.  I felt like an undercover agent.  But I kept quiet, trying to keep my cover.

Eventually, they needed to make a “pit stop.”  Obviously, I didn’t use the facilities. I remember the guy who stayed at the car with me. He came on to me, thinking I was a guy, saying something about how those other guys didn’t appreciate a “guy” like me, offering me some time out back alone. It was clear to me that this “good ol’ boy” was propositioning what he thought was a young man. I managed to “play dumb” just long enough for one of his buddies to get back to the car, thank goodness.

The ride resumed. Stoked with more beer, those guys got even more gross in the rest of the drive. I mean, REALLY??  Does a guy need to jack off just because an attractive woman passes by? But they got to the place that I claimed was my destination, and I got out safely and walked the rest of the way to my college.  I tell it calmly now, but I remember being terrified then. I had been “cool” on the ride, but was terrified once they finally departed and I was back on my way “home.”

Today
All of that came back to me tonight as I faced the dinky little two-block walk back from my mechanic’s.  I know the feeling: If you’re a woman on the street, walking alone, you’re fair game. I’m lucky to have a body-type and walk that can look “male.”  Unfortunately, as I discovered, even if you can pull off a “drag” act, you still might be “fair game.”   What is it about males that makes us vulnerable in either case?

I hate it that I went into “protection” mode for my little two-block walk home. But my history told me it was necessary.

What stories do you have to tell?

College Bound ... and the Gift of Parents

Some of my friends are in the position of taking their sons and daughters to college around this time. I've heard some of them talking about what a difficult time this is—the joy of seeing a young adult child stepping out into the larger world balanced with the loss of having that child leaving home. I offer this blog post in tribute to those parents and to share a bit of my early history.

It was late summer in 1973. I was getting ready for college. 

That in itself was something of a miracle. No one in my familial line had ever gone to college.  Only those in my parent’s generation had even finished high school. 

In my little graduating class of about 100, few were going to college. Of those few, virtually all were going to state colleges within a hundred miles of our small town.  Most were going to remain on their family farms or find jobs in the banks and small businesses of our small town.

I had been a very odd valedictorian. I’m sure it grieved the administration to give me that award, but my GPA had earned it – despite my frequent battles against that administration, my scofflaw attitude, my smart-mouth relationship with underqualified teachers (in a poverty-riddled school district). I may be the only valedictorian who had been barred from the National Honor Society. I was not an egghead or a geek. I was a good athlete (in those days before Title IX), an “A” student without needing to work at it, and quite outspoken in expressing my convictions and acting on them. I did not suffer fools gladly – among my classmates or in the faculty and administration. My sassy attitude had earned me the reputation as a discipline problem. Unable to handle me, by my senior year, most teachers had banished me to “independent study” – which meant that, instead of being in the classroom, I spent most of my time in the school library preparing papers on topics they had assigned to me.

With a good GPA and having scored well in the SAT and ACT tests – as well as being a National Merit finalist – I received a lot of literature from a lot of colleges.   I made my initial sort on two criteria.  First, I would not attend a college that had sororities and fraternities.  I had observed the tyranny of social cliques in my small town and didn’t want to enter an academic community that mirrored that.  Second, I would not attend a college that engaged in serious intercollegiate athletics.  I had seen what a focus on athletics did to academics. I had seen the jocks slide by and suffered through history courses taught by coaches who had no grasp of the subject matter.  No more of that for me.  Those two criteria made it easy for me to toss most of the college promotional materials into the trash.

But one day I received a simple tri-folded postcard from the University of Dallas.  I don’t remember the details. I just remember it spoke of the value of learning for its own sake, the life of the mind, the joy of intellectual curiosity, a belief that truth is a thing to be sought.  I was hooked.  After many twists and turns, I was accepted and awarded a scholarship and work-study that would cover all my tuition and other costs. I had never even visited the campus, which was 600 miles away in an era where few people flew, and had only spoken with the Dean of Admissions. But the vision of that university matched my own longing. 

Throughout my search for a college, I had believed I was destined for something different (and, better, I believed) than most of my classmates.  I was sick of my narrow-minded little town.  I was going to “break the mold” and “make something of myself.”  Such is the hubris of an 18-year-old.

I vaguely remember the week before my departure for Dallas.  I remember spending much time visiting with my few close friends. …  I visited with a couple of fine teachers who had inspired and encouraged me, and expressed my deep thanks.  [Jim McInturff, I hope someday you Google yourself and find this posting. Your English classes gave me hope and inspiration.] … My parents had separated in early summer, but I had a rather amazing conversation with my father.

To get me and my few belongings to Dallas, my mother borrowed a van.  She, my grandmother, my younger sister, and I set out for Dallas.  We drove and drove and drove.  
Eventually, we reached the Texas state line.  I was astonished to see the highway sign declaring it was still another 200 miles to Dallas.

And that’s when I lost it.  The enormity of what I was doing finally struck me.

We had taken family vacations to visit relatives as far away as Florida or Mississippi.  But suddenly, the enormity of living 600 miles from home, far away from any friends or family – far from anyone I knew – hit me like a ton of bricks. 

I remember my mother was driving the van.  And I remember asking her (or was it telling her?)  to stop, turn around and go home. I said I would be really, really happy getting a job as a bank teller back home or maybe working in the public library. I didn’t want to go to college. I could find a job I would love at home.  That’s what I said, as the enormity of this journey struck me.

Today, I imagine she must have set her jaw and clenched the steering wheel more tightly.  She didn’t even look back to me.  She just said “no” and kept driving.  Surely she said something more than “no.”  But I don’t remember any details.  I just remember that I began rattling out how happy I would be in our little town in some little job … and that she said "no" and kept driving. 

My mother, sister, and grandmother helped move me into my dormitory room that day.  I remember seeing them driving off, and I remember feeling as alone as if I had been deposited alone on the planet Mars. 

That first semester was difficult. No.  “Difficult” isn’t the right word.  I was desperately, miserably homesick.  But I also became engaged with my classes, stimulated by my new classmates.  I found people with whom I could talk into the wee hours about literature and philosophy – thinking “deep thoughts” and dreaming great dreams.  At the University of Dallas I found a community like I had never had.  I ended up feeling “at home” and finding there a community I never could have imagined. I loved that place!  It formed me in lasting ways and launched me into the life and career I now have.

I don’t recall how many years it took for me to remember and realize what my mother did for me on that day as we drove toward Dallas. But I’ve known it for a long time now.  I can just imagine how much she must have wanted to say “yes” when I asked her to stop, turn around, and take me back to my small town and what would have been its small existence for me.  But she didn’t.  She – the daughter of sharecroppers – insisted on taking me to that university far from home. She must have had dreams for me – dreams that were strong enough to keep driving instead of capitulating to my fervent request and taking me back home.

I can’t ask her those questions, for she died a few years ago.  We had a “complicated” relationship in the last years of her life. But I will forever be grateful that – when I asked to back off of my dreams – she said “no.” She said “no” even though it was probably against her own selfish wishes. She said “no” because she had better hopes and dreams for me.  I will be forever in her debt.

Some of you are now in the position of my mother – though you are very different than she.  You are sending or taking your children to college. I salute you. I recognize the sacrifice you are making: Sending your children to their dreams, while your heart may be breaking as you send your child into the wider world.  God bless you. I hold you in my prayers, and I trust your children will be as grateful as I am to my mother.