What Are You?

Jeff Levy, LCSW
(originally posted on Branching Out: The Live Oak Blog, July 2014)

Over the weekend, my partner and I were meeting with a man who was going to do some work on our home.  After we talked more specifically about the work, we engaged in some casual conversation. This man shared he is in therapy (before he even knew I was a social worker!) and went on to share that his therapist is Jewish.  In the same conversation, he said that when his office manager scheduled his appointment with us, she told him “you know they’re gay?”  “I don’t care who they are,” he said he told her.  “As long as they pay their bills!”  And then he smiled and continued the conversation.
 
After he left, I looked at my partner, half amused and half incredulous.  “What did you think of that?” I asked him.  “Eh,” my partner replied, rather nonplussed.  As I’ve gotten older and as some things have changed around accepting difference, I tend to be more surprised when someone makes statements like this.  In some ways, I have been lulled into a place of comfort.  I’m not as vigilant about how others may perceive me.  I forget that aspects of who I am may carry judgment.

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