And it\u2019s not a man\u2019s world if it\u2019s my world<\/strong><\/p>\nIn 1980, somebody stole my bike, a Huffy 5-speed girls\u2019 model, from our side yard. In my journal, I wrote about its replacement. My dad had bought me an old beat-up orange 10-speed \u2014 the only thing wrong with it was that it needed air in the tires.<\/p>\n
The new-old bike looked just right:already broken in, sleek, a touch too big for me. It was like inheriting a perfect pair of faded, ripped Levi\u2019s from a brother I didn\u2019t have. At fifteen, I didn\u2019t play sports, but I cycled all over our Chicago north-side neighborhood and beyond. I couldn\u2019t wait to be seen unlocking this battered bike in public.\u00a0<\/p>\n
In our garage, my dad put new tubes in the tires for me. As he watched me pump them full of air, I realized I\u2019d have to learn to fix a flat by myself pretty soon.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThe tires and the chain look good, so you should get a lot of use out of it if you don\u2019t mind riding a boy\u2019s bike,\u201d my dad observed.\u00a0<\/p>\n
I sighed. Had we \u2014 the familial \u201cwe,\u201d the societal \u201cwe\u201d \u2014 not outgrown the ridiculous idea of girls\u2019 and boys\u2019 bikes?\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThis kind is probably better, so people just say it\u2019s for guys,\u201d I said. I whirled my right leg back and around and stood over the horizontal top tube, which brushed the ragged edge of my cutoffs.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cWell, it\u2019s made for boys,\u201d my dad said. \u201cBut it\u2019s not too tall for you, so you should be fine.\u201d<\/p>\n
Made for boys. The phrase felt like a stone in my shoe.\u00a0<\/p>\n
I rode to the beach and back. Leaning forward to reach the drop-style handlebars made me feel taller and seemed to give power to my legs. Biking through the neighborhood, I was absorbed in my surroundings. I felt skilled, unselfconscious, and a little bit tough. I wondered why boys wanted to fly along with their vulnerable nuts only inches above a metal bar. Maybe they should ride step-through bikes, I thought. Girls were more rugged down there.<\/p>\n
Later, in my room, with its green-painted desk and Endless Summer poster, I brooded. Step-through bikes for girls were one of a host of distracting and annoying ways in which girls were differentiated from boys for no good reason. Debates over women\u2019s equality had been in the news all my life. But even if I was equal, it seemed I wasn\u2019t supposed to feel similar to boys or men. Girls were supposed to remember we were girls at all times. A boy\u2019s hobbies and opinions made him an expert, and girls were supposed to admire him \u2014 not be similarly involved and expert. Don\u2019t imagine you\u2019re athletic; don\u2019t imagine you\u2019re a Star Trek fan; don\u2019t imagine you\u2019re funny, because women aren\u2019t. So what did \u201cequality\u201d mean?<\/p>\n
I wanted to express opinions, explore my interests, talk about them freely, and have my jokes laughed at. I wanted to be taken seriously when I saw a male as a role model instead of as a crush, or to enthuse about a non-traditional woman \u2014 say, a female musician or activist \u2014 and not hear her scoffed at for doing something men do. At fifteen I wouldn\u2019t have been able to articulate this, but I was pretty sure I\u2019d never have a boyfriend until I met a guy who shared my interests without trying to take sole ownership of them.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s still a man\u2019s world, Fran,\u201d my dad would say, when I chafed against the unfairness. His placid tone seemed to push me to\u00a0 accept an immutable second-class status; it made me furious. I wanted that bike-ride feeling to fill my life. I felt like a person on a bike, felt like I was anyone\u2019s equal, a strong and fit person who happened to be a girl. What would I have to do, I wondered, to be treated as an equal?<\/p>\n
Maybe my prickly discontent helped me filter out the jerks. Just a few years later, my first boyfriend was indeed a great bike-riding partner. We tore around the north side of Chicago, egging each other on to longer distances. Later, my future husband bought a bike as soon as we started dating so that we could ride together. That commonality doesn\u2019t seem so remarkable now, but back then, most guys I met just wanted to attach me to their own hobbies.<\/p>\n
At fifteen, would I have been surprised to learn I would eventually find a career in a traditionally male field as a strength and conditioning trainer? I\u2019m sure I would have loved to know that when I grew up I\u2019d lift weights and develop muscles. But if you\u2019d told teenage me that I would join competitions, go to seminars full of men, and start teaching people to lift \u2014 hard nope. I would have seen nothing but the risk of being belittled. Even in my 40s, those learn-to-coach weekends, so full of male shouting, made me nervous. But, to my surprise, I also found the shouting encouraging. Men and women befriended and supported each other. In general, I was treated with the camaraderie I wanted when I was young, and I relished it. These rigorous challenges let me grow into my new career.\u00a0<\/p>\n
I had managed to hold onto that feeling I loved at fifteen, of reveling in what my physical body could do, until it finally became part of my working life. I\u2019m a strong person, who happens to be female, who can share her expertise and get respect, with no fussy fake dividing lines between what guys do and what women do. My dad stopped telling me it\u2019s a man\u2019s world and started asking, \u201cHow\u2019s business?\u201d And of course, female lifting coaches aren\u2019t that rare now. I\u2019ve known and worked with non-binary and trans trainers and trainees, too. The more voices, the better.<\/p>\n
These days, bike rides still boost my mood and center me in my most real self. It\u2019s the feeling that signaled empowerment when I was a teen, and I feel it when working with fitness clients too. It\u2019s the feeling of being an outward-facing person in the world, unselfconscious and free.\u00a0<\/p>\n
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