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On Being an Elderly Queer Cis Gent with a Mature Trans Woman on My Arm
I’m quite familiar with those askance looks and murmured remarks.
At the beginning of 2017, I was preparing to embark upon what in retrospect seems a crazy, Quixotic journey.
Distraught over the results of the recent presidential election, I found the very thought of Donald Trump being inaugurated as President of the United States frightening and repugnant. And, with such division, animus, and downright meanness proliferating across America, I scarcely recognized my own homeland.
So, inspired by a woman named Peace Pilgrim — who, starting in 1953, walked the highways of North America for 28 years and more than 25,000 miles — I decided to follow in her footsteps, to find out if there were still nice people in America.
In advance of this adventure, I reached out to some local municipal, county, and state officials. I received especially supportive responses from my Oregon state representative and a certain county commissioner. (For the purposes of this article, let’s call them James and Bob, respectively.) The local Gannett paper, too, published a cover story on my pending peace pilgrimage.
The day after Inauguration Day, January 21, 2017, millions of women and supporters of women’s…
