(It’s about seven am and my shift’s almost over. A young woman steps over.)

Young Woman: “Hello, I have a meeting in your meeting room today. Can you unlock it for me?”

Me: *in the middle of something* “Okay, give me a minute and I’ll be right over.”

Young Woman: “Okay.” *waits for a second* “Now?”

Me: *sigh* “Fine.”

(I grab the keys and unlock the door, then hurry to finish my work. A few minutes later, the same young woman’s back.)

Young Woman: “Excuse me; there was no projector in there. I was promised there would be!”

Me: “Um, I don’t know…”

Young Woman: “I was promised one! How will I do my presentation?”

(Luckily, my coworker arrives to relieve me and I hear him argue back and forth with the young woman about her supposed promised projector.)

Young Woman: “The sales manager promised me a projector!”

Coworker: “Let me call the sales manager.”

(At this the young woman frowns but doesn’t disagree.)

Coworker: “Hello, [Sales Manager]? Yes, there is a young woman here to do her presentation in the meeting room, and she says that she was promised a projector, and there is none.”

Sales Manager: “What? I never ever promised her that!”

Coworker: *to [Young Woman]* “She says that you were never promised a projector. Anyway, we don’t have one to give.”

Young Woman: *stubbornly* “I… I… was!”

Coworker: “You want to talk to her?”

(The sales manager and the young woman argued for a bit, and the young woman stomped off to get her own projector. She was unable to find one and had to do her presentation without slides, I heard. Boo hoo.)

(I work as a college counsellor.)

Me: “So, have you decided on any other schools that you want to apply to?”

Student: “Well, I was thinking about the University of Massachusetts, Boston, but it’s so far away.”

Me: “But you’ve already decided to apply to other schools on the east coast. Why is this one too far away?”

Student: “Well, it’s in England.”

(I sat there gobsmacked for a bit. The kid thought that New England was part of Great Britain. I laughed for quite a bit, and even reminded the student that after taking AP US History he should definitely have known better. And yes, he did apply to UMass Boston.)

(This clothing store has a men’s floor and a women’s floor with corresponding fitting rooms. Today, I have a more masculine look and am wearing a binder. Unfortunately, I find techs all over both the store escalators, so I have to leave the store and use the mall’s escalator. The clothes I’m carrying also all have security tags. I flag an employee.)

Me: “Hi, I would like to try on these clothes but the escalators are broken.”

Employee: “Oh.” *thinks* “Uh, actually, which fitting room do you prefer to use?”

Me: “Well, I honestly don’t really care. I’m non-binary, but I can get in trouble with the law if I use men’s, so I usually don’t try.”

Employee: “Follow me.”

(He takes me to the men’s fitting room and speaks quietly to the attendant. The attendant then goes inside and shouts:)

Employee: “Anybody have a problem with a non-binary person in here?”

(Various customers reply with a, “No.” The attendant comes back out.)

Employee: “Come on inside. No one’s going to report you.”

(I went back a couple months later when the escalators were working, and that same first employee saw me and asked which fitting room I preferred to use that day.)

(It is when when Facebook is in its infancy. While my siblings and I each have created our own pages, our parents have not. My younger brother has recently moved six hours away from our parents to attend college out of state in Ohio. He posts pictures of his college life, one of which is of an attractive girl sitting on his bed with a textbook in her lap. I look at the picture and quickly spot a few “interesting” things. Based on what I see, I form what I believe to be a logical conclusion, one that I know our parents would jump to if they saw the same photo. I decide I’ll try to save my brother a headache and give him a call to see if I came to the right conclusion. I give him a call and quickly bring up the subject of the photos, commenting on how nice they look. My brother quickly catches on.)

Brother: “You want to know who the girl in the photo is and if I’m dating her.”

Me: “I won’t deny my curiosity about the girl in the photo, but I’m honestly more interested in how you’re doing.”

Brother: *sighs* “She’s a friend I’ve made recently. My roommate and I are in the same psychology class, we formed a study group, she’s part of the study group, and now we’re all friends. Just friends.”

(We continue to talk about this group of friends he has made. He states they’re all from different parts of Ohio, that he’s the only one in the group not from there, they’re all majoring in something different, etc. At the end of it all, I’m glad to hear he is doing well, but he still hasn’t addressed the reason why I called. I continue to play along and get as much information I can get him to divulge.)

Brother: “So… are we done?”

Me: “Not quite. I know that you’re not telling the whole truth about the girl in the photo. So I want you to tell me the whole truth about her, and in exchange, I’ll tell you why you should take that photo down before Mom and Dad see it.”

Brother: “I told you already; we’re just friends.”

Me: “Friends with benefits, possibly?”

Brother: “Uh…”

Me: “Look, I get it. Being away at college and living in a dorm allows you certain freedoms that you wouldn’t otherwise have living at home with Mom and Dad. I don’t care what, or who, you do, as long as it isn’t illegal, you keep your grades up, you’re not hurting yourself or anyone else, and you’re protecting yourself doing whatever it is. And I’m certainly not going to tell Mom and Dad, either; they don’t need to know. Just tell me the truth.”

Brother: *long pause* “Fine. I like her, and she likes me, but neither of us want to be in a serious relationship right now, so we hook up every now and again. What I want to know is, how did you figure that out by just looking at one photo of her?”

Me: “Easy. Clue #1: You’ve made a point to take and post a photo of this girl, and it isn’t a group setting or anything like that. That indicates to me she is someone special. And trust me, Mom will jump to that same conclusion. Clue #2: If you’re going to start posting your photos, figure out how to remove the time-stamp feature on your camera. The photo is time-stamped for Saturday at eight am. Way too early for a study session, if you ask me. Not to mention she looks like she just rolled out of bed. And finally, probably the biggest indicator, is Clue #3: You’ve freely admitted to me she is a local girl, so what reason could she have for wearing a t-shirt with your high school’s name on it? And don’t tell me there’s a high school with the same name in Ohio. Mom has washed that shirt plenty of times, and I’ve seen you wear it often enough to know that it belongs to you, because you can see the tear in the sleeve that yours has.”

(My brother was utterly baffled by this and immediately removed the photo from his page. A few days after that, our Mother called him to let him know she signed up for Facebook and wanted him to accept her friend request. He thanked me for helping him dodge a bullet from our ultra-conservative parents.)

(My wife and I have been living in a tiny studio apartment for three years and have finally decided to upgrade, so we are applying for various low-cost one-bedroom apartments within our budget. There is a low-income housing complex nearby that looks promising, so we fill in an application and my wife drops it off after work. She gets a call a few days later and we are invited to see the place. My first name is Alex, and we are both women. Upon our arrival, the landlady gives us an odd look as we introduce ourselves.)

Wife: “Hi! Thanks for inviting us to see the place. I’m [Wife’s Full Name] and this is Alex.”

Landlady: *confused look* “Where is your husband? Is this your friend?”

Me: “I’m her wife. My name’s on the form we filled in.”

Landlady: “Alex is a man’s name. I was expecting a man.”

Me: *laughing, assuming she’s making a joke* “Oh, yeah, I guess it could be confusing, but I’m–”

Landlady: *suddenly icy* “Why did you lie on the form?”

(We didn’t lie or leave out any information, and the form never asked us for our genders. We are both caught off-guard by her sudden change in tone, but before we can say anything more, she snaps at us again.)

Landlady: “I’m sorry; you’ll have to leave.”

Wife: “But we haven’t looked at the apartment yet.”

Landlady: “I’m afraid the apartment is gone. I offered it to a couple who just left before you arrived.”

(She was exuding hostility and while my wife looked ready to argue, I was starting to get anxious and upset, so we left without making a fuss. Since we were never formally offered the apartment and couldn’t prove that we were discriminated against, we didn’t take any action against her, but thankfully we find a much better apartment a couple of months later. On a whim, around that time, I looked up the apartment we had visited before, and lo and behold, it was still listed as available!)