Will the REAL Kathy Please Stand Up?

The other day we had a problem with our cable reception, with various channels coming in scrambled. I immediately called Comcast to try to sort it out. Kathy had already tested one TV upstairs and I had tested the TV in the studio, so I reported that we had the same problem in both locations. The call center guy, however, needed me to check the TV in the living room, too. So, with him still on the phone, I trotted upstairs and turned the other TV on, flipping to the scrambled channels.

While we waited to see the results, he made small talk. Kathy, who was in the living room doing something else, overheard only my end of the conversation:

"Yeah. Okay, nope, that channel doesn't come in, let me try another. <pause> What? Hmmm, no, I don't think I have any relatives there; my family is all from Wisconsin."

Kathy's head turned sharply toward me as I continued talking. After all, she knows my family is not from Wisconsin.

"Well," I said thoughtfully, "I suppose we probably have distant relatives in Ohio, but I don't know them, no. But you're right, it is a less common name."

At this part, she started laughing as soundlessly as she could, because while I am not from Wisconsin, she is. She realized that yet again, I was impersonating her.

As the cable guy made an appointment for me, I said, "You know, I might not be here that day, but I'll have my partner Alix handle the appointment. Is that okay?" He said, "That's no problem. Thanks for calling, Kathy." I wished him a good evening and then I hung up.

"You're so much more polite on the phone than I am," Kathy said, continuing to crack up. We had a good laugh together.

You're probably wondering exactly why I was impersonating Kathy. It's because if I don't (especially when I'm calling the telephone or cable companies) they won't let me do anything with our account. They insist they must talk to Kathy because, by all that's holy, I might be asking for illicit repairs or something. What if the real Kathy doesn't want her cable fixed? Who the heck is this Alix character, anyway?

I don't remember having these problems back when I was married, even though I didn't take my husband's last name. But in this relationship it is so common that I answer to 'Kathy' at the drop of a hat, sign packages as Kathy, and can rattle off the last four digits of her social security number as though they were my own. If Kathy were any less secure as a person, I suspect this might be disturbing.

It's not that my frequent impersonation doesn't cause any trouble; it certainly does. Why, just recently I was talking to my mail carrier and he said, "You're Kathy, right?" I debated saying yes, but given that we talk about his wife's breast cancer treatment and serious stuff like that, I came clean and said, "No, actually, I'm Alix." I might have blushed, too, because I bet I've signed as Kathy in front of him in the past, not knowing we'd end up chatting it up sometime in the future. Oops.

When we do stick to our proper identities, we find that plenty of people just can't handle the confusion of two women who share a household. Since I'm the one home most often, it makes sense for me to handle repairs, installations, and deliveries. But that doesn't mean my name belongs on everything. When we had the furnace upgraded, Kathy's name had to be one on the paperwork, as the corresponding income tax credit would be reported on her forms. However, all the one-on-one contact was with me. The result? Newsletters from the heating company addressed to my first name and her last name. Does 'partner' mean 'sister' in some lands?

The worst mix-up was when I checked our medical insurance claims and found that LabCorps had billed a recent test with my first name and her last name. Since I filled out the forms correctly, I can only assume this is because they don't have fields in their database for people who have their benefits through their domestic partner. Because of this mix-up, it took a while for insurance to pay. Belatedly, I realized that this might have been more than just a delay. It's possible that my doctor never received the test results, either, because a fax with that name on it would have been tossed out as irrelevant. Given that this test was to check my kidney functioning after an adverse drug reaction, I find that possibility a bit worrisome. Good luck to me when I make the call to the doctor's office and try to explain this!

The name game, though, gets just as confusing when she refers to me in conversation to someone who has never met me. Often, they assume I am a man named Alex. I never expect that (after all, in my mind, I'm girly Alix!) but every so often I shake hands with someone who is frowning confusedly at the introduction. It takes them a moment to re-order everything in their head - probably not unlike our mail carrier, who swore I was Kathy for a year and a half.

So, is it only heterosexual married couples who avoid this crisis of identity, or am I handling it all wrong? I don't know, but one thing I found out recently is that when I go to Home Depot, it's a good thing I am not married. Just recently one woman shared her story online about how her local Home Depot would not schedule an in-home design consultation unless her husband was present. It's corporate policy, of all things. You know, because women can't make decisions all by their lil' ole selves. What do you want to bet they would schedule an appointment with the husband without asking for the wife to be present?

Hmmm, suppose they do acknowledge same-sex couples? What happens when lesbians call to schedule? Will they not meet with either one of them?

Kathy said oh, no, with two women, you go to Lowe's. Problem solved.

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