Nicolas and another counselor are talking about the way she conects with clients who are over forty. There are very important generational differences in the way that people relate to latex barriers as sensual objects. She uses the client's memory of "dental" dams in order to connect with the client about condom use.
C: I've always been uhm told by people that I'm a little older than my age, my wisdom is a little older than
Nicolas: Well you look a lot younger.
C: Yeah, I do. Yeah, yeah and that's another thing when I relate to clients and I'm really trying to get someone uh (.) from about forty up, who'se not used to using condoms, who doesn't have a clue about our, the world as it is now, when I'm trying to talk to them I have to bring in my age, uhm at some point cause I'll keep, I can, because I think they pick up on it like the gentleman I had on uhm Sunday I was talking to him about dental dams and he's fourty four.
The trainee, who was in her twenties, was sitting in the room and so the client and I, you know I'm saying you know, I was giving him latex barriers and stuff like this and said you know like dental dams and he looked and she looked but she's thinking dental dams as we use them today, she's not thinking dental dams as he and I was relating to dental dams so I said,
"You know, you remember dental dams, you remember when you spoke to the dentist to get a tooth pulled (name) and they used to put this square thing and the rubber went around and they poked a hole," and she's like looking trying to figure out where, what is she, what is she talking about, that's not what you use the dental dam for, and I said remember they used to isolate the tooth and your tongue kept hitting that rubber and it was like, yeah and she was like, she kept looking at us and I said, I said how old are you again I asked her and I said oh, no no no, I said, see when we used to get our teeth filled that's the way they used to do in your mouth, had to be open and then he could, he really started loosening up and that told him ok, maybe this person in front of me isn't as young as I thought she was.
And I then I brought up something else and then I talked about Trojans and in the olden days one size fit all rubber and I told them I'm going to show him some different rubbers and show him that there are different sizes and flavors and colors and lengths and everything like this and so (....), one of the things she mentioned she said, how did you know to go into the dental dam thing? I said because I needed to get him, get his attention on something because he was listening to me I was getting through to him, but he kept having that eye up, like this look of glossing over, I said I needed to bring him into something he could relate to
N: something physical like you could relate to the feeling of the rubber on his tongue
C: Yeah cause I was, I used to hate those, I used to hate those, I was so glad when they just let you hold your mouth open but that wasn't until, uhm, college when they would just let you hold your mouth open, but you know when you're in elementary school and high school they used to put this big old square thing over your mouth and tell you, you know, try to keep your tongue from popping to the rubber but your tongue kept touching that nasty rubber and when I, when we, when you guys brought out dental dams I'm thinkin' auuhh, I remember those. Those don't look like they're gonna be fun.
N: Well it's good thing people forget their original use. It's not a good association.
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