Brain exposed – Austin’s favorite transvestite

            There is an intersection in the heart of Austin which defines its downtown. One way, traffic moves towards infamous Sixth Street, where everyone turns 21. Perpendicular, on Congress Ave, cars and bikes race towards the funky trailers and vintage shops that make up SoCo; opposite on the same street is a procession towards the state capitol, lined with tall, column-like buildings.
            There dwells the quintessential Austin character himself, semi-celebrity Leslie. He wears a tiara, a long, kinky grey beard, a padded bra, a leopard thong, and some fierce high-heels. For tips, he’ll take a picture with you; you can also purchase his dress-up magnet or iPhone app. He wields a cardboard sign protesting the cops’ treatment of the homeless, but wants to be clear: “I’d wear this outfit whether people look at me or not,” he said, “I’m just havin’ a good time.”

            Albert Leslie Cochran grew up relatively normally in a large Catholic family in Dade County, Florida. His history is a series of disjointed details: he spent a few semesters at University of Florida - Tallahassee on academic scholarship and then a brief time in the Navy around 1975. He also deejayed, worked at a Safeway grocery store in Washington, tanned road-kill hides in Colorado, and bounced around between states in a converted bookmobile. He tried staying for a while in Atlanta, near his sister Alice, or in Washington, managing a warehouse, but was always driven to move again. For some time, he worked as a truck driver on the West Coast, traveling endlessly. “He just kind of did his own thing,” Alice said. “He’s highly intelligent, and sometimes highly intelligent people are strange.”
            But the cross-dressing queerness Austinites adore didn’t begin until after a later head-injury. “Before, [no one] expect[ed] him to live like that at all,” Alice said. To my knowledge, he’s never mentioned the pivotal motorcycle accident which his sister placed at Steamboat Springs, Colorado in the late 80s.
 
            Austin is a city that understands America’s deer overpopulation. It is estimated there are over 4 million white-tailed deer in the state of Texas alone. There is nothing really remarkable about seeing deer, and traffic accidents involving deer are considered unfortunate, but not uncommon.
            But the accident in Steamboat Springs was outstanding. Leslie was traveling at such high speeds that he cracked the deer’s head open. Blood dripped onto the asphalt. The motorcycle lay on its side. Albert Leslie Cochran remained in a coma for over a month. Before, there was an incurable stutter in his speech; somehow, that was left on the black pavement. The deer’s head lay in the middle of the road, split in half, brain exposed.
According to Alice, that wreck sparked the change from “Albert” to “Leslie.” “That’s when he went into the odd dressing and all of that. It was a shock to our mother,” his sister said, chuckling. “It was [also] that accident that triggered him living on the street.”
            His restlessness grew even greater and he panhandled across states, doing quite well for himself. So well, Alice laughingly recounted, that he passed on the generosity: she would occasionally come home to find her homeless brother had left groceries on her doorstep. He made enough money to stay in touch with his family, getting brief holds on cars or phones. “I don’t know how he got to Austin,” Alice said, “but suddenly, there he was.” In 1996, at Congress and Sixth, “he found his niche.”
            Later, Leslie explained how he hopped onto a three-wheeled bicycle and spent a year traveling cross-country to this city that prides itself in “Keeping Weird.” His signature get-up began on that trip, he claims, to beat the heat. Three weeks after arriving, he was arrested for the first time. Leslie was arrested 28 times in his first three years on charges that were almost all dismissed. A longer 1997 arrest began his political involvement; he made a sign advertising that the police “put [him] in jail on false charges for six and a half months” because he was unable to make bail. “Basically, my protest is my job. It doesn’t pay anything, but it’s more important,” he said. He became an advocate for homeless rights.
            It was on that platform that Leslie ran for mayor three consecutive times. A decade and a half after smashing open the deer’s skull, he gave a serious speech in Austin’s mayoral elections, then strutted down from the podium to reveal a tutu splaying out from under his tuxedo. “If I don’t get 10% this time, I don’t know if I’ll run again,” he told reporters with a wink and without a stutter. “Gotta have some self-respect.”
            Leslie’s part in the race was surprisingly legitimate, from real suggestions to improve homeless rights (Teepees on unused land) to taking a stance on other issues (opposing two-way streets downtown, controlling urban sprawl). “"I am not the homeless cross-dressing candidate," Leslie stressed, "That really irks me. I'm the candidate for respecting Austin as it is.” Leslie also described how he would be different, a “24-hour mayor,” in a mobile mayor’s office. “And I’m a genius at finance,” he said, “When I get money, I buy everything I need and then I go buy a beer. That’s what we need at City Hall.” After he “got tired of spending $500 [he] didn’t have on campaigning,” Leslie retired his mayoral career. His best run, he came in second place with 8% of the vote.
            Austin is a city that understands the problem with normalcy. There is nothing remarkable about a normal person, nothing to distinguish them from anyone else. Most Austinites couldn’t tell you who did win those three mayoral elections, off the top of their heads, but they could tell you about Leslie. In fact, odds are, they want to; he’s become a source of pride for this Weird city.
            The elections grew his popularity even more; he became a mascot for Austin, a kind, harmless, hilarious man who was just shamelessly enjoying himself. His dress-up magnets increased his income, and drunken college students began to pay for pictures when they ran into him in the bars and coffeeshops downtown. Choosing to remain homeless, Leslie clearly found his home. He’s been settled here since that long bike ride 14 years ago.
            October 3, 2009, Leslie was found crumpled on the side of another road, unconscious, severely injured. Immediately, he was rushed to Brackenridge hospital, where he required surgery to relieve the bleeding on his brain. While he cannot remember details, he says he was jumped for warning a group of guys about the dangers of cocaine. Doctors seemed to believe he fell; police did not investigate. “Ain’t my first rodeo,” he said when he regained consciousness. “Well, life is like shit. It happens.”
            Austin cared for Leslie like a mother, even if he was technically adopted.  Frantic local media pestered doctors for constant updates to his condition, publicizing signs of improvement the moment they were available. Local bars, like One to One, or homeless outreach groups, like Mobile Loaves and Fishes, raised funds in his name. “Local street celebrity Leslie Cochran needs help paying the bills,” headlines declared, and people dug into their pockets.
            The city’s love for Leslie cultivated in a candlelight vigil outside the hospital, where supporters held up their own cardboard signs advertising affection. Doctors advised Leslie to stay off the street as he healed; “He won’t want to,” predicted his sister knowingly, and sure enough, even in the hospital, Leslie said he “really wanted to escape.” The first place he went to after discharge was Twin Liquors. “They told me to make some big changes in my life,” he explained, “so I changed doctors!”
            Shortly after that, he was back at Sixth and Congress. In his teetering heels, he’s found stability.