I had my first Manhattan apartment well over a decade ago on 90^th and Central Park West that I shared with another girl, we were just entering drinking age and both waited tables at Houlihan’s on 59^th and 5^th. When not slinging beers for non-tipping European tourists (back then the tipping customs were still blurry I guess) our evenings were spent trolling New York’s bar scene.  I was single back then, and while never naïve my friends and I were slightly carless with our attire, showing more skin then maybe I would now and characteristically unconcerned with the “what if’s” that living in the city held for young attractive women.

We knew to walk fast looking straight ahead with purpose, and a lot of us attached pepper spray to our key chains, come to think of it you don’t see that so much anymore. Hmmmm? The one common thread though stringing us all together was the subway flasher.  We’d all seen one at some point.  The lone man sitting across from you, full car or empty, afternoon or night, he’d stare at you just long enough for you to notice and when you did there it was, his exposed member glowing beneath the fluorescent bulbs.  Some stories are more horrible than others and I am happy to say that that mine went pretty much as I just described it.  Not pleasant, yet hardly traumatic.  But there are men who have done unspeakable things on a busy subway when fronts are pressed to backs and well, let’s just say they, left their mark on a friend of mine.

Yes, that is correct.

So this supposed new string of flashers has grabbed the attention of a city and perhaps that has made it front-page news but I promise you this is nothing new.  The only difference now is the invention of the camera phone so flashers beware.  If you wish to be spared the embarrassment of the world knowing what New York women have known for years.  Keep it in your pants.

And ladies, I’m beginning to see a light at the end of the flasher subway tunnel.