Human

It’s time for me to stand up and be counted as part of the trans rights movement.

Given the current cataclysm of democracy, it’s time for every one of us to be louder about All The Things, but this particular issue is personal. I’m not trans, but I am noticeably bad at being cis-gendered. Yeah, that’s me in the ragged T-shirt and the cargo pants from the men’s rack at Value Village. I enjoy heavy carpentry and recreational math. I wrangle my hair with a rubber band. In my 52 years, I’ve never owned makeup, nail polish, earrings, razors, or a purse.

The fact that I have never really felt mentally or emotionally female (or male) is no secret; I describe myself that way in a chapter in Rebecca Thompson’s newly published book about motherhood (Held Together), and I blogged about it as long ago as 2013 (How to Be a Zero). Long before that, it was probably obvious to those who knew me.

Or maybe it wasn’t. I live in a society that is fairly tolerant of unfeminine women -- especially when they are straight, white, educated, middle-aged, and married with kids. Despite never completely conforming, I’ve mostly had it easy. I say “mostly” because puberty was a hellscape that it took me years to recover from. Alienation and dysphoria are topics for a different day, but it’s important to note that the fact that I leaned to live with the cards I was dealt does not mean that everyone should, or can. However, because I could, I’ve enjoyed a lot of safety and privilege. This means that I am exactly the kind of person who should defend those who are much more vulnerable.

So why haven’t I been loudly claiming one of the labels now available for enby-ish folks? Why haven’t I shown up with more flags at more rallies? And why haven’t I stepped up to be a mentor, or at least a listening ear? The short answer is that a few years ago, as the trans movement started to gain ground (and, alas, draw more hateful attention) I wanted to leap in, but I found myself struggling with feelings of loss.

It took me a long time to explain that to myself, and to start coming to terms with it. The crux was that recognizing the irrefutable existence (and struggles) of trans people required that I believe in gender. I don’t mean “gender separate from biological sex” (noting that biological sex also has a wide range of naturally occurring variations) but rather “gender as something that exists at all”. Believing in gender as anything other than a social construct required upending my worldview. It made me feel alone.

In defense of my logic, gender is widely recognized by psychologists and sociologists as being at least partly a construct. How people define “masculine” and “feminine” differs enormously across cultures and eras. Who wears high heels? Wigs? Rouge? Who does the farming or the fishing? It depends. Plus, humans are clearly capable of assiduous (and violent) group-think relating to categories that are not innate, such as nationality or sports-team fandom. For me, gender seemed like that: a flimsy construct built from prejudices, social norms, early conditioning, and habit. It wasn’t hard to convince myself that everyone else was, essentially, brainwashed and faking it.  

The best analogy I can come up with is blood type. Biologically, I have Type O+ blood. I’m suffused with the stuff. Fine, whatever. But if society obsessively labeled me as “O+” and demanded that I dress, act, and think like an O+, I’d feel gaslit: a frustrated disbeliever.  Likewise, ever since I was a little kid, boy-stuff and girl-stuff – all the divisions of pronouns, toys, clothes, friendships, hobbies, emotions, and every other damn thing -- felt burdensome, arbitrary, and just…not real. It was easy to persuade myself that my gender-free viewpoint was an enlightened one.

I was wrong about gender. In recent years I’ve had to admit that to myself. Cultural details may vary, in terms of who works in accounting or wears skirts, and science has yet to conclusively find gender markers in our brains, but it’s now clear that most people really do “feel” either female or male in a way that I do not. I struggle to “get” trans-ness because I also struggle to “get” cis-ness. Shifting my worldview is challenging. It requires rewriting my beliefs, and trying (again) to figure out who I am.

Many people are choosing new labels and pronouns. I’m glad of it, for their sakes, but it doesn’t solve my problem, because I never wanted to claim a non-gender for myself; I wanted the world to ditch the whole concept of gender. That’s not going to happen, so I’ve added “she/they” to my email signature. It’s not precisely right, but it comes closest to what I want to say.

In some ways, I should be an excellent trans ally. In other ways, I’m clearly terrible at this. Cis people who do “feel” their gender might be better equipped than I am to empathize, but it doesn’t always seem to work that way. I get it. Shifting worldviews is hard. But being kind and accepting of other humans?  That’s not that hard -- and it’s always, always worth it.

Standing up and being counted feels important, because large, vocal, visible minorities are harder to marginalize. When I hear people (usually my age or older) arguing that this is a “fad”… yeah, no. If a group of people have been hiding to escape persecution, that doesn’t mean they don’t exist. The classic example is left-handedness, which was noted in only 3% of Americans around 1900, when lefties were met with suppression and suspicion, but which has held steady since the 1960s at 12%. Shout-out to the right-handed Boomers who normalized their “sinister” classmates!

Gen Z didn’t invent gender, or trans-ness, or dysphoria. They didn’t create the confusion, and they certainly didn’t create the hatred and anger; on the contrary, they started trying to unravel it, diffuse it, solve it. They broadened the ways in which we’re able to talk about ourselves, express ourselves, and be ourselves.

Has this process been perfect? Of course not. Is it complete?  Clearly, no. I’m lucky in that I don’t need anything – medication, specialized medical care, access, different bathrooms, a new name, or different pronouns. I don’t even particularly need emotional support or guidance, not now. But I sure could have used some help and understanding back when I was fourteen. Thus I – and I suspect millions of people like me, who have lurked awkwardly and semi-invisibly for decades – do have a role to play, even if it’s simply noting that we exist. People are suffering. Kids are endangered. I have to try.

So – hi. Here I am, a Gen X human who is maybe a bit different from most people, but maybe also a lot like some people? I honestly don’t know.  But I’m ready to get loud about it.

Eagle

from video by Eric Fletcher, MIT

"Oh, there's a bald eagle"

“Wait, what?”

“A bald eagle,” my daughter Lizzy repeated patiently, over the phone.

I was walking along snowy forested trails near our home just outside Fairbanks, Alaska. Four thousand miles away, Lizzy was walking, too -- along the Charles River, near MIT’s iconic dome, at the heart of a sprawling metropolis of about five million people.

“I’ve seen eagles around here before,” she added. “There might be a pair of them nesting on campus.”

“But…” I was still having trouble processing this.

I lived in Cambridge myself, from 1990 to 1995. I jogged that busy waterside footpath from Harvard to MIT to Boston Harbor. I crossed those bridges that connect the bustle of Cambridge to the high-rises of downtown Boston. In the early 90’s, sighting a bald eagle at MIT was not just improbable, it was ludicrous. But now my Alaskan teenager was nonchalantly noting a wild predator with a seven-foot wingspan soaring over the Charles.

“Wait, what?” was a reasonable question. The answer requires more words, but it’s a story worth telling. Or perhaps I should say two stories: one about the birds, and one about the river. Both involve a little historical context.

In the 1900s, America almost destroyed its national icon. Bald eagles were hunted, then poisoned by DDT so that their eggs weren’t viable. Their numbers dropped precipitously. By 1963, there were only an estimated 417 breeding pairs in all of the contiguous US; only Alaska (which became a state in 1959) maintained a healthy population. For almost a century, there were not only no bald eagles in Boston, but also none anywhere else in the state of Massachusetts.

Eventually, public sentiment – about eagles, and about conservation in general -- spurred a series of actions by the federal government. In 1940, the Bald Eagle Protection Act made it illegal to kill Haliaeetus leucocephalus. The passage of the Endangered Species Preservation Act in 1967 and then the Endangered Species Act in 1973 allowed bald eagles to be listed and further protected. In 1972, thanks to diligent scientific research and years of public outrage, DDT was banned.

Even with protections in place, so few bald eagles remained that populations couldn’t recover. Active restoration and reintroduction were needed. In 1982, MassWildlife and US Fish and Wildlife experts worked together to relocate 41 young birds from Michigan and Canada to the Quabbin Reservoir in central MA.

Eagles mature slowly, so it was 1989 by the time the first successful pair raised their own chicks. But success accelerated thereafter. Bald eagle numbers in the state have risen steadily, and young avian couples have spread their wings to find suitable nesting grounds: tall trees near large fresh or salt waterbodies where fish abound. About 90 nesting pairs were recorded in Massachusetts last year.

Meanwhile, the river…

When I was a young adult in Cambridge, the Charles River was a filthy sewage-laden embarrassment. I even worried about the drops of water that splashed my hands when I ventured out to row with my dorm-mates. It was said that anyone who fell in would become a mutant -- or outright dissolve. That was a joke. The part about being advised to get a tetanus shot after a dunking?  That was for real.

There were rumblings, back then, about cleanup. I heard, when taking a class on environmental issues during my senior college year, that a long-term effort was perhaps going to be undertaken to make the river “fishable and swimmable”.

Fishing and swimming? It seemed far-fetched.

There were, apparently, a couple of hardy anadromous species that sometimes managed to pass through Boston Harbor and into the Charles in the early 90’s, but the river wasn’t exactly a thriving ecosystem. It suffered from a dearth of any kind of wildlife, let alone the iconic American raptor. There were precious few swaths of anything resembling natural vegetation. I saw occasional ducks and gulls, perhaps, but even from the close vantage of a tiny wooden boat, I don’t remember spotting a single fish.

What does it take to make a contaminated urban river fishable and swimmable?  As it turned out, it took a legal challenge, a lot of science and engineering, a good chunk of federal funding, and a huge amount of work and dedication.

Starting in 1995, the US EPA partnered with a host of local governmental and non-governmental organizations to create the Clean Charles River Initiative. The initiative ultimately completed two major projects. It built an ambitious water treatment plant, the Cottage Farm facility, to deal with the overflows that regularly occur during storms. It also rebuilt a hundred miles of illegal and faulty storm drain systems to prevent illicit sewage discharge. In the past thirty years – one generation, from me to Lizzy -- these measures have reduced the quantity of sewer overflow discharge flowing into the Charles by an astonishing 99.5%.

So: the birds, the river.

I’ve visited Cambridge with my family many times over the years. But our visits have been brief stop-ins during the winter, and have largely focused on spending time with my sister and her family, and on doing “city things” -- art shows, science museums, and restaurants.  Last August, however, I spent ten days in Massachusetts, dropping off first one daughter and then her twin at two different colleges. In hopes of familiarizing Lizzy with her unnerving and overwhelmingly urban home-away-from home, I took her for a walk along the Charles. I was looking for the tiny sliver of green space I remembered.

I found more than I expected.  

Hundreds of geese honked and waddled on the riverbanks, unconcerned by joggers, energetic toddlers, and polite leashed dogs. The birds munched not on garbage or moldy bread crusts, but on a variety of grasses and wetland greens. They were joined by a wealth of other waterfowl, including massive dignified swans. And then, as Lizzy and I made our way from MIT along the slow curve upriver toward Harvard, we found ourselves in a spacious park. I halted in confusion. “This… wasn’t here before,” I said.

Magazine Beach park is a 17-acre haven of mixed-species lawns, shade trees, and healthy tangles of waterside reeds and grasses. A small visitors’ center offered us not only a bathroom and a place to fill our water bottles, but also some excellent displays chronicling the cleanup of the watershed and ongoing environmental efforts.

The Charles River is now mostly swimmable, although there are some days when it still doesn’t meet rigorous EPA standards. There are no regular swimming facilities yet, but a couple of public swimming events and races are held each year. It’s home to more than twenty different species of fish. For human fishers, only catch-and-release is allowed.

Eagles, however, can eat their catch, should they choose to frequent the banks and waters of the Charles. And, as witnessed by a nonchalant teenager from Alaska*, the eagles apparently do so choose.

This year, now, 2025, there are bald eagles soaring over Boston. They symbolize decades of environmental commitment, scientific research, lawmaking, judicial oversight, targeted federal funding, engineering, restoration, cleaning, volunteering, collaboration, grassroots community action, long-range planning, genuine love, and boundless hope. In other words, they symbolize the very best of America.

There are bald eagles soaring over Boston.

The birds, of course, have no idea what they symbolize.

But I hope America remembers.

 

From video by Eric Fletcher, MIT

 

* And plenty of other people, including several news outlets and an MIT employee, Eric Fletcher, who shared a video on Reddit.

 

 

 

Fresco/Cable 2024

Thank you for choosing Fresco/Cable 2024, a blend of new and traditional flavors since 1999! Each wholesome, high-fiber, organic¹ day was lovingly grown and hand-picked by members of our own family. From the chill darkness of January 1^st to the also chill darkness of December 31^st, we selected the very best hikes, theatrical performances, peculiar hobbies, and hilarious pet antics to make this year enriching, satisfying, naturally sweet, and full of crunchy goodness.

Long before it reached your table, this delicious year began at the Fresco/Cable Farm² in Fairbanks, Alaska with the classic warmth of a roaring fire³, a purring cat⁴, and an enthusiastic⁵ sled dog who is always eager to join us on all our snowy adventures. We followed this up with a sprinkling of academic writing, a dash of conference attendance, a soupcon of coding, and a sweet taste of Kokhanok.

Springtime included planting a new driver's license and sowing new ideas and experiences via college visits⁶. A piquant roster of high school classes, aged to perfection through the spring thaw, were topped with a delectable graduation ceremony in May.

Summer’s harvest featured two fully-grown twins – celebrated with cake and puzzles. At the height of the season, as the abundant wild blueberries ripened in our very own mosquito-infested swamp, we infused our recipe with hints of Greenstar microchips, Shakespearean battles, backcountry tussocks, and the copious droppings of swallow hatchlings.

This fall, we expanded our farm to two new locations in Massachusetts: Amherst College⁷ and MIT⁸. This resulted in many memorable new flavors, including Art, Biology, Calculus, Writing About Nature, Writing About Poetry, Chemistry, Physics, and Multivariable Calculus -- always a crowd-pleaser⁹.

Meanwhile, we continued to offer our more traditional flavors, including UAF, Rock Climbing, Horseback Riding, Marathon Slog, Excessive Snow Biking, Wrenching Political Angst, Why Are You Borrowing a Victrola, and Ten Minute Play About Something Nerdy.

In this cozy¹⁰ winter season, we hope you enjoy every heaping spoonful of Fresco/Cable 2024. Write to us to share your own favorite recipes!  From our family to yours, we wish you health, happiness, and a resilient sense of humor. As always, please continue to savor our full range of delicious years, including our upcoming new offering, 2025!

 

¹ Not certified organic; 2024 includes pesticides, herbicides, microplastics, unidentified lint, and lost socks.
² Not actually a farm, despite all the kale
³ It’s a pellet stove, whatever
⁴ Deeply affectionate, highly opinionated, and allergic to everything, including human dander
⁵ He means well
⁶ With huge thanks to Sarah, then and throughout the year
⁷Slightly farm-like?
⁸ Most definitely not a farm
⁹ If you hang out with the right crowd
¹⁰ Dark and frigid