Surprise Naked Gay Bike Ride in St. Louis as We Continue Transgender Trek
A much needed day of queer whimsey
We never would have guessed we were going to end the evening watching hundreds of naked people ride past us on bikes as we finished up our calzones.
When my wife and I arrived at our St. Louis Bed & Breakfast, we found it full of conservative artifacts, and we resigned ourselves to a very familiar conversation. We’d already experienced the cold stares of strangers driving slowly by, fixating on us for looking different. We’re used to this as an interracial, queer, trans polyamorous married couple. Experience suggested that an evening out could easily produce worse situations for us in a conservative place.
“Best case scenario, we’re probably going to get a lot of murder glares if we go to a restaurant. Should we just get a pizza delivered and hide out here?”
My wife didn’t like the idea of hiding, the way we often have had to in rural North Carolina. After all, we’re moving all the way across the country just to feel safe being ourselves. A day in a delightful gayborhood in Louisville, Kentucky had likely helped make her feel more bold.
Just 24 hours after a harrowing drive through flooding mountains, we woke up in a beautiful bed & breakfast, having slept under an embroidered sign saying “Joy Is an Act of Resistance.” As we sat up, we found ourselves facing a wall full of signs, including “Y’all means all”, “We will fight so love will win,” and a quote from bell hooks:
“Sometimes people try to destroy you, precisely because they recognize your power-not because they don’t see it, but because they see it and they don’t want it to exist.”
We walked outside and learned we had accidentally slept right in the middle of a gayborhood in Louisville. No wonder our studio apartment bed & breakfast was so affirming. It was surrounded by rainbows. We went from store to store and explored. One store had a courtyard full of rainbow umbrellas above it!
In the same store, we found a cow wearing broken glasses and smoking with rainbow crystals hanging from the end of her pipe. It was so bizarre and oddly beautiful that I had to take a picture to share. This place seemed to radiate whimsey.
As we explored, we found more rainbows and murals. One rainbow mural had a quote from Mister Rogers that had a special meaning in that neighborhood: “Often when you think you’re at the end of something, you’re at the beginning of something else.” Those words were the perfect thing to see while processing my own feelings about leaving the place where I grew up behind because we’re queer and trans.
Reluctantly, we left that beautiful place behind and drove from Kentucky, through Indiana, then Illinois, all the way to St. Louis, Missouri. All of that was only a 4 hour drive, but it crossed through a time zone, bringing us an hour backwards in time. This was my first experience driving across a time zone in this way. I’d only ever managed to give myself jetlag by flying.
Most of what I saw in Indiana was corn fields, but they were beautiful in their own way. We stopped to stretch, so I took a picture that you’re probably skipping over to get to the naked bike riders. I’m keeping it here for myself, though.
The part of Illinois that we drove through was similar, covered in flat land and farms. I took a picture of this lovely farm where we stopped for another quick stretch.
Feeling empowered from this whimsical day full of queer adventures, we ignored our feelings of unease in our conservative-looking bed & breakfast and googled LGBTQ+ friendly restaurants in St. Louis, Missouri. We quickly found some in an area called the “Grove”. We were excited to have accidentally found another gayborhood full of rainbows. We relaxed as we walked down a street full of the beautiful, affirming murals of our people.
We’d just finished eating our calzones, when we were greeted with one hell of a surprise. Out the window, we could see hundreds of naked people riding bikes down the street! This was not what we would have expected when we arrived in a very conservative heartland neighborhood to a room that looked like it could have been Dorothy’s old Kansas home in Wizard of Oz, complete with an American flag welcome mat, Revolutionary War plates, multiple holy bibles, and books by Ronald Reagan and Rush Limbaugh to add to the Republican atmosphere.
Though I’ve been trying to promote trans body positivity and comfort with trans sexual expression in my publication Trans Love & (A)Sexuality, the truth is that I’m far from comfortable with my own trans body and sexual expression at this point.
It’s hard for me to imagine feeling safe going shirtless where other people could see, much less riding naked on a bike down a crowded street. Given this, I found it incredibly touching to see other trans people feel comfortable enough with their bodies to participate in this giant naked bike ride.
I saw one rider with a unicorn horn accompanied by fake hair in the blue, pink, and white colors of the trans flag. I saw a trans man wearing a rather sizable rainbow prosthetic strap-on while riding his bike. A trans woman was riding along in a red dress, looking very comfortable. I thought I spotted a few other gender diverse bodies as well. It did my heart good to see.
Then, we saw bunches of police lights behind what appeared to be the last group of naked bike riders. My heart skipped a beat. I figured the police must be there to arrest this group of wild protestors. I turned to my wife and suggested that we should probably leave, before this gets ugly.
“Wait! No! The police are here to escort the naked bike riders. They aren’t here to arrest them. They’re here to protect them,” my wife said, studying the situation in awe.
We both watched, uneasy as it became clear that the police were doing just that. They were protecting the naked bike riders. We were speechless. This was not what we were used to seeing from police.
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