Boomer was transphobic to me not realizing I'm trans.

I went home to South Dakota for the first time after transitioning, and honestly? I had an absolutely wonderful time despite frankly being pretty afraid to come back given...everything.

But by God, the Boomer Hive Mind can't let a nice thing be, so when I was in the airport on my way to leave, LITERALLY about to board the plane to GTFO, this Boomer I'm sitting next to sparks up a conversation with me. Pretty friendly Midwestern thing to do, and we start chatting about this and that, and he reveals that his wife died about five years ago and that he doesn't have a ton of contact with his kids. The conversation winds down, and I feel pretty good I was able to have a warm conversation with this lonely old man.

But then out of the fucking blue, and I can't overstate how unrelated to anything this was, he leans in to me and says, "To me the greatest tragedy is that a woman can train her whole life at her sport and then have to face off against some man." To which I respond, "Excuse me? You know what I am, right?"

Oopsie Daisy! Boomers face drops. Conversation proceeds like,

"Oh!!!! Well, I couldn't tell! You look great!"

"That's not a compliment. Do you even have a clue what it is we do to transition?"

"Uh no, not really..."

"Then how can you say what we can or cannot do? The hormones we take obliterate our muscle mass and organizations like the NCAA mandate that we be on it for years. You obviously couldn't tell I was trans, so how different can I be from a cis woman really? Also, do you know what percent of the population we even are?"

"Uh...6?"

"No. Try 0.6. So less than half of that tiny percentage are trans women, so this sure seems like an absolute nonsense controversy. Also, who just blurts this out in a conversation with someone they just met?"

I get up to leave. The Boomer looks at his feet, ashamed, and mutters something like "I don't have a problem with anybody..." I say, "Sure sounds like you do," and walk away.

Please forgive my little "And then everybody clapped!" story, but it is truly fucking embarrassing that a human being's lifetime of accumulated wisdom led them to think that this is a proper way to interact with people. The man confessed to me that he was incredibly lonely at the tail end of his life, and while I wasn't going to be his best buddy or anything, I could have been a warm human interaction that it sounds like he desperately needs. But nope. Guess you fucked it, bud. Have a nice life.