The vicious absurdity of bathroom laws

Last Sunday afternoon was breezy and bright, but I was too lazy to take the dogs for a walk so a friend and I drove into town to grab a cup of coffee. It was just your standard, laid-back, happy, Sunday-afternoonish sort of outing.

On the way to the coffee shop we swung by our local library. There were a couple of men – nice-looking grandfatherly types – standing near the entrance with a trestle table on which they had a couple of three-ring binders and some pamphlets. Attached to the wall behind them was a shiny sheet-sized poster featuring some message about “freedom and privacy for all” and a picture of a cute little blonde girl.

Not this kid, but you get the idea. Who wouldn’t want her to be safe and happy?

As I ambled past them one man approached me with a binder, which he flipped open to reveal a sheet of paper about one-third filled with names and signatures. “Would you like to sign?” he asked.

“Sure!” I said – after all, we all like freedom, privacy and pretty little girls, right? I assumed it was a petition relating to the recent demise of internet privacy protections. I hadn’t really thought through what the little girl was there for … maybe protecting our freedom and internet privacy is a way to ensure her a safe and happy future. But to be honest, I didn’t think about it. There was a spring-like song in my head that didn’t leave a lot of room for logical analysis.

The man beamed at me, handed me a pen, and held out the binder for me to sign. “So what’s this about?” I asked, casually, just making conversation, and because even on a sunny spring day with a song in my head I am not a total idiot.

“House Bill 1011,” he said, and when I looked blank, pen still poised above his piece of paper, he explained, “We believe people should have the right to vote when their privacy is affected.” I continued to look blank, but the song in my head was beginning to weeble.

I honestly don’t remember what he said next – he was still beaming and I think stretching his lips like that made it difficult for him to speak intelligibly – but you already saw the title of this post so you know what’s coming. For starters, the pen in my hand suddenly turned into a snake and bit me. “Oh my word!” I exclaimed, flinging it away. “You’re talking about restrooms? You’re trying to control how transgender people use public toilets?” He blinked and his beam wavered into bemusement. “Ugh! That’s disgusting! Your bigotry is disgusting!”

Now I really don’t do confrontation. I mean, I do, but only under duress, and I need some sort of warning – time to work up a head of steam that will enable me to blast through my tendency to stutter when stressed and sob when angry. Under the circumstances I turned out to be as incapable of intelligible speech as he was, so I stormed into the library and slapped some books around.

When I stormed back outside the pair of them huddled together but stood firm, awaiting my next attack. I felt a bit sorry for them, actually – they were just a couple of gaffers doing their bewildered best to hold back the horrifying onslaught of … whatever it is they find horrifying. So I asked them some questions along the lines of “Have you ever actually heard of a case of a transgender person assaulting a little girl in a bathroom? Or of a predator dressing up as transgender in order to do so?” and they explained that they just wanted people to have the right to vote about something that affected their safety and privacy, so I asked, “And what about the safety and privacy of transgender citizens?” and … really, again, I don’t remember what they said. It didn’t have any logical handles that would enable it to attach to my brain.

So I shouted a bit and used the “bigot” word and waved my arms and didn’t make a lot of sense because another thing that happens when I’m upset and stressed is aphasia takes control of my tongue – sometimes it’s so bad the only word I don’t forget is “aphasia”. But this is what I wanted to say to them. This is what I should have said. This is what I’ll say next time.

First of all, just how does this whole transgender thing work? Well, I’m no expert, but as best I can figure it out from reading what various transgender people have to say on the subject, it seems to me that transgender people are the gender by which they identify. It’s not just a feeling, or a mood, or a phase. A person can have a penis and still be a woman, or a vagina and be a man. What, you don’t understand it? I can’t help you with that, because nor do I. But so what if you can’t? The older I get, the more things I find I don’t understand. Usually, in my experience, if I leave them alone and don’t poke at them with a pointy stick, they leave me alone and nobody gets bitten.

Secondly, this issue of who gets to use which facilities. Transgender women dress like women; I’m willing to bet most of them look way more feminine than I do. (Yes, that’s a low bar, but still.) Transgender men dress, walk, look like men. Republican dudes and duffers, do you really want someone in a dress and high heels standing next to you at the urinal? Or touching up her lipstick at the sink in your public restroom? Quit being dickish about this, and it won’t happen … because transgender people use stalls. Men with vaginas aren’t equipped to use urinals. Women with a penises will choose to wait … and wait … and, holy cow, cross their legs and wait in line for a stall rather than use the urinal in the men’s room.

Mind you … speaking as a woman who has, on more than one occasion, disdained the long line leading to the women’s room at a busy supermarket, preferring to dash straight into the empty men’s room right next door, I don’t really get why separate facilities are necessary. As far as I’m concerned, the sooner we switch to unisex restrooms the better. Although … yeah, they can tuck the urinals off around a corner somewhere … I don’t want to have to see that. (Sorry, guys, I know you’re awful proud of them and all, but they’re just not pretty.)

I borrowed this cartoon without permission, because it says what needs to be said and it wasn’t clear where permission might be got. Please check out their website so they get some benefit from it.

Getting back to the point, thirdly, there’s the issue of enforcement. Are you going to appoint genital police to peek inside everyone’s underwear before we’re allowed through the door? Because I really don’t see how that will enhance feelings of privacy! Maybe this law will apply only to people whose community knows they have transitioned, like at schools. How’s that for a great way to encourage tolerance and civility – forcing a girl (with-a-penis) to use the same shower and toilet facilities as the tender-hearted fellows on the football team!

Because, of course, fourth point, let’s not forget that this all starts with concerns about safety. Those worried folk who are so anxious to strip transgender people of their peeing rights aren’t naturally mean, they’re scared. They’re scared of big hairy men putting on dresses and claiming to be women in order to invade their little girls’ potty spots and Do Nasty Things to them.

The thing is, rape is already against the law. So are assault, indecent exposure and harassment. Predators don’t care about restroom laws. When they are set on doing their predatory thing, they already disregard far more powerful laws, with harsher penalties than anyone could dream up for using the wrong bathroom.

I wish people like those two old gaffers would stop and think about who is really at risk here – the girls with penises and boys with vaginas who just need to pee, in safety and privacy, same as the rest of us! And then get the heck out of there, because no one actually wants to hang out in a public restroom!

That’s what I wish I’d said, in calm and measured tones, but instead I got loud and emotional, and when I realized I was about to start sniveling I whirled around and stomped off, and nearly slammed into a couple of young people – a tall girl and a short man – who were standing just a little way off.

The young man said, “Um, I just wanted to thank you.” He gestured in the direction of the gaffers. “For what you said there.” I mumbled something awkward and incoherent. He said, “They asked me to sign and I told them I couldn’t because it would mean I’d have to use the women’s bathroom, and they seemed to think that would be okay.”

Completely inappropriately, because I was still all discombobulated and upset, I hugged him. He didn’t seem to mind, but I wish I’d known what to say.

What do you think about legislation requiring people to use the restroom intended for their assigned gender? If you had been involved in this conversation, what would you have said?

 

Tripping with the Girl Child

There is a moment in every woman’s life when she knows that she will never camp again. For me, that moment came last Saturday morning, somewhere between dragging my protesting bones off a thin foam mattress and across wet grass to a porta-potty, and realizing that I’d forgotten to bring a cup and therefore had to rinse my contact lenses and brush my teeth in Argos’ water bowl.

Not that I’m complaining. Self-knowledge is a good thing. Also, my road trip with the Girl Child has been … what word works best? Delightful. Healing. Rejuvenating. Joyous.

A gift from God.

This is true even of the itchy bits: A couple days without showering. My snoring, Argos’ licking of parts best ignored, her acute sensitivity to annoying noises. Conversations about subjects previously skirted – God (I am a grateful believer in One who gives with a lavish hand; she calls herself an atheist and speaks of “putting things out to the Universe”), love, sex and dating (Himself is irredeemably male; she is in love with a young woman she met on Tinder, and while telling me about Tinder she mentioned the “fake lesbians” who hunt there for thrills – but, she told me, you can tell them by their talons. I did the blank stare, and she waved her beautifully polished but short fingernails at me. More blank. She rolled her eyes. “Mom. Please don’t make me explain why lesbians don’t grow long fingernails.” Comprehension smacked me upside the head and I squeaked “Oh my word, TMI!” and blushed like a virgin). Conversations about the past – sad and happy memories, regrets and forgiveness, perceptions and assumptions and explanations – and about politics, books, ethics, the meaning of life, and, naturally, family gossip.

Inevitably, our road trip got off to a chaotic start. Between a big deadline and the need to transform a black hole of doom into a comfortable spare bedroom, I’d had no time to worry about trivia like grocery shopping in advance for a trip that wouldn’t happen until days after her arrival. Suddenly it was time to meet her at the airport, followed by much running around and visiting with people, in between firing increasingly irate messages at Emirates Air demanding to know what they’d done with her luggage. (It arrived on a late flight the night before we left town.)

We picked up our hire car from Budget at about the time I’d planned to get on the road. (That’s when we learned that a second driver added around 70% to the cost of the hire. For the same amount of car. No, it makes no sense to me either.) Then we rushed home to pack, but first I insisted on spring-cleaning the house in an effort to assuage my guilt over abandoning Himself to the care of seven dogs and a horde of other critters, while the Girl Child flung things into the car more or less at random. (Actually, that’s not true – she packs as though she’s solving a tetris puzzle. So what in fact happened was, I flung random suggestions at her and she gathered things together and stowed them neatly away, and it was therefore entirely my fault that we left without eating or cooking utensils or, come to think of it, food.)

The plan was to get to our cottage in central Oregon, about four hours drive away, at lunch time. As noon approached, the Girl Child became restive and I said “Stuff it, this is clean enough” and hurled my mop at the bucket. We loaded ourselves and Argos into the car, and headed for the hills.

Argos was pleased to find that we’d remembered to pack his toys. (Pic by the Girl Child.)

Of course, we have taken hundreds of pictures. I will refrain from sharing all of them – but look at this one of the Oregon Scenic Byway. Did you ever see a more deliciously open road for beginning a life-changing journey? (Pic by the Girl Child.)

There are many beautiful places to see in Central Oregon. I’d whittled the list down to four … but in fact all we managed were the Painted Hills. We had to go twice, to see what they looked like in the evening and again by the fresh light of morning.

The Painted Hills – they sprawl like a pride of lazy, loose-limbed beasts drowsing through the eons.

One place we didn’t manage to see was the Blue Basin. This gave us a taste of what we were missing – and whetted my appetite for a return visit.

Every potty break for Argos was a photo opportunity.

We spent the night at a cottage in Mitchell. It was clean, spacious and comfortable. The only downside to our stay was the inevitable toilet mishap – and it was almost a relief to get that done and out of the way early. (My relationship with toilets is a whole other blog post, which I will write one day … enough to say that although I love to travel, my bowels do not.)

Now that I think of it, the other downside was the absence of anywhere to eat in Mitchell. Everything closes at 7.00PM. Dinner was a couple of blueberry muffins and a glass of milk that we’d picked up en route for breakfast.

There may not be a whole lot to Mitchell, but what there is is decorated in memorable style! The outside walls of every store downtown featured fascinatingly random works of art. (Pic by the Girl Child.)

Our next destination was Crater Lake. It was late afternoon by the time we got there. We drove through forest tunnels that were veiled with heavy smoke from the fire at Medford, but the lake was dazzling in the low light. Of course, we had to go back again the next morning so she could see the incredible blue of the water and to putter around taking pictures of flowers and trees and weird rock formations. (See how self-controlled I’m being? I’m making you look at hardly any of them!)

Crater Lake with the afternoon sun on it. (For a pic taken a few years back, showing the incredible blue of the water, see here.) (Pic by the Girl Child.)

Day three had us heading for the Oregon Coast, a stay at one of my favorite places and Argos’ first encounter with the sea. Moolack Shores Motel is a couple miles north of Newport, and the couple who own it have so much fun doing it up all arty and interesting and fun. When we walked into our suite (“the hunting lodge”, complete with rifles and rods, a deer head mounted over the bedroom door, and wood carvings by local artists) the view of the Pacific blazed through the big picture windows at us. I expected Argos to be at least a little fazed by the hugeness of the ocean, but no – he knew right away that sand was for running and waves for dancing and friends for making.

The view from our balcony. You can’t see them, but there are whales spouting and generally lolloping about next to the rock to the right of the lighthouse. (Pic by the Girl Child.)

By then, we were tired of the road, and packing up to leave the next morning was hard. Lesson learned: road trips are better if you drive only every second day.

It took us more than 12 hours to get from Newport to Neah Bay, because of course we took a detour to look at some or other scenic something, and around midday we stopped at Safeway to stock up on food and got sucked into a time warp. (While in the time warp I temporarily lost control of my faculties and bought a leg of lamb and mushrooms and baby potatoes, and a couple of aluminum roasting thingummies and insisted that I was going to fix something delicious on the barbecue for dinner. More about this later.)

On the other hand, we found a town called Humptulips. Yes, really – google it if you don’t believe me. The only public loo is a porta-potty on the side of the road (Girl Child’s review: “It’s clean enough – just don’t look down.” There is a general store with an alarm that shrieks long and hard every time the door opens, and a young woman behind the counter who looks as though she’s waiting for someone to rescue her. I hope they don’t keep her waiting too long!

We actually saw quite a few towns that, for one reason or another, felt like the set of a reality show. Like this place – just look – guns, ammo, booze AND worms, plus a bear and flags lining the main road. To quote the Girl Child: “Murrica! Hell, yeah!”

And then there was this. “Welcome to our town. Behave, or we’ll bomb you.”

Neah Bay is on the Olympic Peninsula, which just happens to be one of the wettest places on earth. Seriously, parts of it get 10 feet of precipitation every year. So, of course, we had to camp there. We spent the whole long day’s drive wondering whether we’d packed the rain cover for the tent, and also whether we’d be able to inflate the air mattress, which we bought en route in the trusting but false assumption that it came with some sort of blower upper. It was dark when we arrived and we were all three of us grumpy and fed up with this whole road trip nonsense, and although the tent went up more-or-less waterproof and a fellow camper provided a bed inflator, I didn’t sleep well because the Girl Child kept waking me up to accuse me of snoring.

We camped on an undeveloped site with friends, one of them a member of the Makah tribe whose family owns the land.  (Pic by the Girl Child.)

The next morning I kicked the Girl Child out into the cold rain with instructions to explore Cape Flattery and the museum … and I spent the entire day in bed, snoozing and reading. Everyone else left on various errands, and even Argos seemed relieved to spend a day Doing Nothing. It was bliss! Until I noticed that the rain had soaked through the tent wall and my sleeping bag was sodden … but that didn’t happen until much later, and it led to the epiphany I mentioned right at the beginning of this post. No More Camping For Me!

One of the Girl Child’s pictures. The sea has chewed crevasses and caves into the base of Cape Flattery, giving it prehensile toes that dig into the ground to hold the Olympics in place.

We took Argos for a run on the beach toward the end of the day.

Having slept, and then ambled pleasantly along the beach, I was happy to not worry about the lamb, which we didn’t cook because the friends we were camping with had planned a fish bake. I will eat someone else’s baked fish over any cooking of mine any day! And I figured the lamb would do fine for our next stop, as long as we kept topping up the ice it was packed in.

On Day six we were back on the road again, with a full bag of soaking laundry and craving a hot shower. First there was a long drive to Port Townsend, then a ferry across to another island, then the beautiful bridge at Deception Pass, seafood dinner in Anacortes, a late ferry to Orcas Island, and a slow drive down narrow and twisting roads between hedgerows and fields. I wonder if all islands try to look like England? At last we reached our destination: a resort where I had paid a bloody fortune to hire a tent. Not a wet and flappy tent that we had to erect ourselves, mind you – a permanent tent, with a solid carpeted floor and an actual bed and – or so I presumed – Conveniences.

We expected a place to cook. A small fridge. A shower!!! (Did I mention that after two days of camping, bracketed by two days of travel, we were more than a tad stinky? And itchy! Yuchh!)

Well. First there was the Stench. It assaulted our nostrils as we entered the resort, and was so bad I couldn’t even blame it on Argos. We mentioned it to the ditzy young dingleberry in reception, and she giggled and changed the subject. Then there was the tent … and it was a very nice tent, dry and clean with a fair view – only the bed was on the small side, but we had to share because there was no bedding for the futon. There was also no fridge, and nowhere to cook. (There was a place to barbecue, but it was an uncomfortable distance from our tent – and there were signs everywhere warning of a burn ban due to the hot, dry weather.)

We resigned ourselves to dining on cheese sticks and chips, and went in search of the showers, There were two showers, three toilets and four basins to serve about eight tent cabins and a full campsite. One of the showers was available, so the Girl Child went in (it was her turn to go first) and peeled off her disgusting, damp, smelly clothes. There was a pause, then I heard, “Mom? Do you have any quarters?”

Yep, it took around four quarters to have a halfway decent shower. Because everyone walks around with spare quarters in their pockets. So, kind reader, what do you think? Do you think I left her, naked, reeking and shivering, while I hurried to find my purse, which didn’t contain any quarters, so I drove to the store at reception, only to find they had closed? Or did I stick my hand into the pocket of my jeans and find a bunch of quarters that were left over after I washed the rug for her bedroom at the laundromat? I’ll give you a hint: there are several practical reasons why I believe in a God of miracles.

The resort didn’t win any stars, but Orcas Island is a delight. We took the short hike at Obstruction Pass – the Girl Child and Argos ran the mile to the beach, then ran some more while waiting for me, and eventually ran back to the car. I found the steep ups and downs quite a challenge and was relieved to learn of an easier, more level route back – but it was so worth it, to sit and look out at the islands and throw sticks for the boy.

He loves the water, And he really, really wants the stick. But swim? Nah … he’s not convinced that’s possible.

Then we went up to Mt Constitution, but I was pooped and chilled and wet through from towing a tired and recalcitrant Malinois into a freshwater lake on the way there to rinse the salt water off him.

And now here we are, approaching the end. I’m writing this in a coffee shop while the Girl Child shops her way up Eastsound and back. We have to be at the ferry by 2.00PM, and we’ll be home before midnight.

Maybe I can talk Himself into cooking the lamb…

We have to make one final stop before we leave…

I’ve told you here about our travels. What I haven’t quite managed to put into words, however, is the beauty of the journey we’ve started together. In just a few days, we’ve traveled all the way from rebellious 17 and anxious mommy, to two women who delight in each other’s company. So … yeah, the road trip is all but over. But the journey? That’s just beginning.

(The story of her visit continues here.)

“Fun Home”, by Alison Bechdel

Graphic Memoir, published 2007, available from Amazon.

I tell people I don’t like comics or graphic novels, but really that’s not true. Tintin, Asterix and Pogo were among my best friends growing up, and as an adult I’ve stumbled over several graphic novels and loved them. But for some reason I have continued to bypass that section of the library and book stores.

Fun Home just blew that bit of bullshit clear out my intellectual attic window.

I’m not going to bother to review it. Nanna Prawn says all that needs to be said over at Tipsy Lit. Go on over, have a read, and then … don’t do what I did; do what I’m going to do. Don’t take it out of the library. Just buy a real paper, hardback copy of the book. It’s what you’re going to want to do anyway.