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Saturday, March 3, 2007

Sex change

No, I didn't go for that while I was in the hospital. However, I need to rant.

For those of you out of our news area, the facts. The City Manager of one of our small towns had been considering a sex-change for many years, going from Steve to Susan, and had already taken some preliminary steps. He mentioned this to a few close friends, and the mayor, but had not yet told his wife or 13-year old son. Surprise, surprise, the paper got wind of it and the cat was out of the bag. Within a week the city called a special meeting and fired him. Even though he had received rave reviews for 14 years, they insist the firing was not because of the sex change, but was a "loss of confidence." He was shocked and amazed.

This raises so many questions:

1) Did he think his secret would stay a secret?

2) Didn't he know his small-town voters and officials, after 14 years?

3) Wouldn't wife and sons be the first to know?

Takes me back to a time almost 40 years ago when CJ was representing a lesbian couple who were house painters. We hired them to paint our house. It took forever. During this time, one of them confided that she was in the process of becoming a man. (They had 9 children between them already.) We needed some carpentry, they called a friend who was going from male to female. We needed roof repairs, two friends showed up that were also changing. At one time, we had 7 workers, in all stages of their transition, part of a support group. They enjoyed telling us more than we needed to know of their life stories and medical procedures. They seemed well-adjusted, optimistic, and looked forward to being "normal." I hope things worked out for them. I would think that 40 years might have brought a little more understanding, but apparently not.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Carol:

By the way....the wife knew....the 13 year old son didn't. As of today's paper, Mr. soon to be Ms. Stanton has decided to appeal the City of Largo's decision to fire him.

18 years ago, I told you that you should be a writer, now your blog is proving me right.

Hope you're up doing the jig shortly.

Bobbi (your former Secretary)