Inktober Day 25

For the last few days I’ve done Inktober drawings from the Baltimore area landmark Clark’s Elioak Farm (which houses some of the attractions that were once located at another now-defunct Baltimore area landmark, The Enchanted Forest). For today’s drawing I’m going to focus on a Baltimore area landmark of a different sort.

Maryland Route 2 begins in Baltimore City (where it is known as St. Paul Street). If you were to drive south you’ll eventually go outside of the city and straight into Brooklyn Park (where the street name changes to Governor Ritchie Highway), where you’ll start seeing a variety of shopping centers, car dealerships, fast food places, and shopping malls that seem endless between Brooklyn Park and Annapolis.

If you hit Brooklyn Park at the right moment, you’ll see someone who’s wearing an outfit that’s far flashier than what the locals there usually wear. Sometimes she’s walking along the street but other times you can see her play her boombox full of pop songs while she’s doing some dancing right along the passing cars of Maryland Route 2. She usually goes by the name Madonna Girl Dale but sometimes she also calls herself Britney Girl Dale and Kesha Girl Dale. She is a transgender dancer who’s a major fan of Madonna as well as other female pop stars like Britney Spears, Kesha, and Paula Abdul.

I first heard of this person a few years ago when I saw her walking along Maryland Route 2 while I was driving my car in Brooklyn Park. Our paths would briefly cross again the following year when I went to the May Day protest in Baltimore against the brutal police murder of Freddie Gray and she was there flirting with the police who were on full alert at the time. (Tensions were so high in the immediate aftermath of that murder that the mayor issued a sundown to sunrise curfew. That curfew was still in effect in Baltimore at the time of that May Day protest.) You can see her with the cops at the beginning of the video that I shot on that day.

She can still be found on Maryland Route 2 between Baltimore and Glen Burnie in her flashy clothes dancing while cars drive past her. Here’s my Inktober drawing of her based on one of the many photos that one can find on the Internet with a simple Google search.