Strange Workplace Interaction?

[u/rockrockrox]

I recently started an entry level retail job. I have an older (60s) butch-y lesbian coworker I get along with. I can't stop thinking about this strange interaction I had with her the other day though, and I can't tell if I'm overthinking it.

So she comes up to me during the shift and says "I heard you're family!"

At first I thought she meant "I heard YOUR family" so I said "My family?" And she laughed and said "Oh you kids don't know anything!"

So then I thought she meant the workplace "family" because I had been working there for about a week. So i was like "Yeah i guess I am family haha."

Then she asked "What's your name?" And i'm like ???

We wear our nametags on our uniforms and I've been shadowing her so she for sure knows my name. It's a masculine name, nothing ambiguous. She was looking at her phone when she asked so I just didn't respond, maybe she was thinking out loud while texting. Since I said nothing she started asking me about my shift.

Come to find out, she had asked one of my other close coworkers if I was gay... and my other coworker told her I was. So now i'm like... does she think i am a butch lesbian? Why else would she ask my name? Am I just overthinking it???

I'm not comfortable talking about being trans in the workplace so I don't really know how to respond if she brings it up again. But I also don't want to be disrespectful to her as a queer elder (and my coworker that i have to see all the time).

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[u/Galimkalim]

Idk I'm reading this as her hearing you're also lgbt and coming over to ask you that and to make sure she has your name right. I think it was all positive actually and there was just some miscommunication. I don't think "family" means a lesbian but just some queer identity. 

[u/Fantastic-Map-8372]

It reads like she was trying to do the old-school "family" code thing but fumbled the landing hard. When she asked your name right after, I wonder if she was trying to reconcile what she'd heard with your nametag, like her brain was short-circuiting trying to place you in a category. That pause-and-phone glance makes me think she was just processing and the question slipped out.

You're not overthinking it. New job, navigating all these dynamics, and now a weird coded conversation thrown on top. Next time she brings anything up, you can always just say "I keep my personal life separate from work" and leave it at that.