The thing with having itchy feet is that at some point, it becomes intolerable and you simply must scratch them.
That is just what Kathleen and I will be doing today!
We've rented a car and will be doing the two-hour drive to Kingston for a little visit. We last visited for the day for our anniversary in 2024, had a lovely time, and committed to return some day.
Of course, we're going to do all of our favourite things: explore, enjoy a nice meal (or two, depending on how long our day goes), shop for books, CDs/DVDs, antiques, fabric, etc.
Of course I will be making photos! I have one of the Nikkormats loaded with some Fuji 400 (Fuji-branded Kodak Ultramax? Not really, but close enough for horse shoes!). I'm always tempted to bring more than one lens, but know that it's unlikely that I would switch or enjoy actually carrying more than one, so I've gone with the 85mm Nikkor-H.
Making Photos in Public
It is not too often that when out making photos out in public that I am accosted in some way. In fact, I can count the number of times on one hand and don't even need all fingers.
So when it happened this past Thursday, it stood out. In part, it only stood out because it is so rare. While I don't exactly occupy an anonymous presence in the world as a purple-haired visibly-trans woman, my day-to-day life, on the whole, is not one filled with conflict and tumult. I just go about my day and the biggest difference is that I receive far more compliments. I'll take it!
Still, as I've outlined in the blog piece above (and here, and here), when I was making a photo of the Circle-K beneath the Place Bell parking garage at Gloucester and Metcalfe, a woman, who was passing through the scene, was positively convinced that I was making a photo of her specifically and did not appreciate it.
As I proceeded down the sidewalk after making the photo, she dropped most of her possessions and ran across the street into traffic to chase me down. Once I cottoned to the fact she was chasing me down, I stopped to see what her problem was.
Wide-eyed, she continued to yell at me for making her photo and then tried to give me a shove. Bracing myself, she found that it might not have been effective, so instead decided to heap transphobic invective against me. Nothing novel: just all the greatest hits that I don't need to replicate on my personal blog.
Once that part of the tirade was over, seeking the cherry to top her putrid cupcake, reached for "I'll see you in hell!", a statement that I couldn't help by chuckle about, so, with a stupid grin, I just responded "Yeah, I guess I'll see you there!"
It's part of a familiar pattern, unfortunately. When I experience such encounters in public, 100% of them have been from people who are clearly experiencing challenges much greater than mine.
I can't know for certain what her life was like, but it seemed apparent to me (while partially disassociating from the scene) that she was probably unhoused, but only very recently so. She had a large number of bags with her and when she shoved me, she used a black trash bag that seemed to be filled with clothing or bedding. Two other very large green reusable bags from a popular chain of dollar stores are what she dropped on the opposite sidewalk.
So, on one hand I understand.
There are people out there who make photos and video of others in public, usually for the purposes of feeding the online spectacle and I most definitely have been featured in such content.
It doesn't feel good! I remember one time where I was walking through the Rideau Centre to run some errands after work and some high school-aged girls stopped, laughed, and made unkind remarks while recording me on their phones as I passed by.
On the other hand, it's positively exhausting to walk around with those levels of over-driven awareness that someone somewhere in the vicinity might have a camera. 99.9% of people with a camera in public are not using it to make photos of any particular people or to otherwise make spectacle of anyone.
I know that when I first came out, I was stuck in a sort of hypervigilance mode, always aware of every stare, blink, phone, and smirk. It didn't help that the far-right would-be "influencers" were still skulking around the downtown area.
Some still are!
I generally won't pass Parliament because of them.
February 14, 2026