I have posted about my adventures Riding the Long Island Railroad – wherein each month I get to see what gender the conductor thinks I am. So far this year, my ticket has been punched as female every month except July: it’s ok, it happens.

Today, being the first of October, was a new opportunity to be ‘gendered’ by the conductor. He made his way through the train, stopped at my seat and I handed him my ticket. He punches it with little or no hesitation and hands it back to me. (The moment of truth…) It’s punched as ‘male’.

Oh well.

As I’m looking at the ticket, the conductor says to me, “Oh, I’m sorry. I punched the wrong box.” He then takes the ticket back, punches it female, and circles the ‘incorrect’ punch and writes PIE (Punched In Error.) He hands me back my ‘corrected’ ticket and continues on through the train car. I have had my ticket punched one way – only to be ‘corrected’ later on in the month. However, this was the first time this happened quite like this.

What did the conductor see just a moment later that made him change his mind?

I don’t know – but it was enough to make him feel it necessary to correct his ‘mistake’.

Cool…