A Break-Up

A couple of days ago we went upstairs to get ready for bed and discovered that the lights did not work in any of the rooms, bathroom only excepted. My husband ineffectually fiddled with something, but then we made do with a candle. It did not illumine much, but was romantic, and, thanks to the Kindle, night-time reading was no problem.

The next morning, while I was still sleeping, my husband called Jack and Jack, as his habit is, came at once. We have known Jack at least for 25 years, I think. He did all the electricity work in the first house we owned, and then, when we moved, in the one we moved to, and whenever we had any trouble with anything electric, we called Jack. We wouldn’t even think of having another electrician: Jack’s that good – 100% reliable, honest, fast, accurate, and just a very nice man. Because all the original electric work in our home was done by him, we rarely have occasions to call him; still, perhaps once in a couple of years something would go wrong with the wires and we’d need his help. So we would see him once in a couple of years. He watched our son grow from a little boy into a teenager into a man, and we followed the fortunes of his family, in general terms, from a distance, updated every couple of years on what was going on, as he stood on his ladder or dug into our walls, doing what had to be done. Sometimes he brought his boy with him, who also grew – by spurts – in front of our eyes, from dad’s little helper into his official assistant into a partner.

This time he came without his son. While Jack worked, my husband and he chatted in their usual manner: how’s the business, how’s the wife? “How is your son?” Jack asked. My husband duly reported and returned the question. Jack shrugged his shoulders.

“I thought you should know,” my husband told me after Jack left and I finally woke up, “Jack’s son is gay. Jack cannot accept it. I think they don’t talk anymore. I tried to cheer him up, said, look, it is completely all right now, many people are gay and live good fulfilling lives. If it’s grandkids you are worried about, then, on the one hand, there is no guarantee you’d have them with straight children either, on the other, many gay couples adopt and even make their own…” It did not work. “It’s not the grandkids,” said Jack, “I cannot brag about him anymore.”

“Poor Jack,” I thought, “What a misfortune.” Not that his son is gay, but that this hit Jack so. When being gay was considered a mental illness, learning that one’s child contracted it would also be a blow, of course, a blow similar to learning of any other serious disease affecting one’s child. One would brace oneself and be thankful that the illness is not fatal. Now we know better than to see a biological abnormality and dysfunction in every case of not conforming to majority practices, we understand, as a society, that there is nothing abnormal about this. People are different, that’s all. We also do not subscribe to the traditional sexual morality; we understand it does not fit and is not relevant to our way of life. I’m sure Jack understands that too. He is no homophobe, Jack. He is no anything-phobe, in fact, but a really good guy. I’m sure he would not think less of any of his customers, if their kid turned to be gay, or if they were gay, to begin with. I’m sure he has gay customers and they are as happy with him as we are. So why is it so hard for him to accept his son’s choice, which many in this society make and which he does not judge as immoral?

Liah Greenfeld is the author of Mind, Modernity, Madness: The Impact of Culture on Human Experience

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