I was actually in Israel 10 years ago, so I’m not sure exactly when I heard about Matthew Shepard. But I watched “The Laramie Project” for the first time last week. I had to turn the volume down when they described his injuries, I just couldn’t listen, I felt sick.

One of the things that struck me was the fear of gays and lesbians living in Laramie. They almost can’t believe that some of the actors who come from New York to interview them are gay and living openly. It’s like they’re from two different worlds.

I’m not sure how much things have changed today. Unfortunately, homophobia is the last acceptable prejudice. People feel perfectly free to say things about gay people that they’d never say about black or Jews, for example.

Although I think one thing that has changed is, I have a lot more openly gay friends and coworkers than I had 10 years ago. People I work with have come out since then. I think that’s probably true for a lot of people, at least I hope so.

I don’t remember anything from that time at all. I had just started my sophomore year of college and that summer I had finally admitted to myself that I was gay. I knew what had happened, but I don’t remember it having any visceral effect on me. I was aware, but I didn’t feel anything. I don’t even recall if we had any kind of vigil or memorial — I would doubt it given that ours was a Catholic college, but then again it was also a Jesuit college.

I’ve buried so much of life in the back of my memory that it feels like I was born fully adult in 2001.