When women arrived at the U.S. Air Force Academy in 1976, the institution was not ready for us. The bathrooms, built for an all-male population, were "prepared" simply by changing the sign on the door — the interiors remained unchanged, urinals and all. As a freshman in 1978, I was tickled when I saw that someone in CS 25 had placed imitation flowers in the urinal bowls. It was a small act of claiming a space, and came to symbolize something I would spend years learning. At the time, the Academy valued masculine norms above all else — feminine ones were considered weakness. I embraced the discipline, the rigor, the toughness the institution demanded. But I wasn't willing to surrender the empathy, grace, and femininity I brought with me. I could be disciplined and nurturing. Resilient and graceful. A warrior and a woman. This is why those flowers have stayed with me for nearly 50 years. The urinal is the institution — rigid, functional, male by design. The flowers didn't break it. They didn't replace it. They grew inside it, on their own terms. I met every standard, and I remained myself.