Vice and Virtues

Growing up in Catholic school, I heard a lot about virtues and vices and how the former were good and the latter bad. Catholic school is kind of like that, black and white, good and evil, smart and dumb, Catholic and other.

This is not an exaggeration, but simply how things worked, and what group you were lumped into: "good, smart, white, Catholic" or "bad, dumb, not-white, not-Catholic" pretty much sealed your fate in those hallowed halls. Thankfully, far before the plaid skirts of grade school changed to the grey skirts of high school, I realized life was a bit more complicated than this.

However, I still hold some internal judgments when I hear words such as "virtue" and "vice", which made the past few days quite interesting. Interesting indeed what with it being Pride (a biblical vice) and also time for the President's Stonewall Reception(where he counseled the queers, once again, to have patience (a biblical virtue).

Though not all aspects of Pride fill me with joy or make me proud, it does feel good to see other families like ours, and other kiddos like Baby Bear all assembled to celebrate their sameness and difference in a safe, accepting space. The realization that finding others like ourselves, and finding something in them (and therefore in ourselves) to be proud of is sometimes hard for a recovering Catholic brought up on a steady diet of guilt and, when that failed, humiliation.

But I was proud this weekend. I was in charge of the little one each morning, and got us out of the house and ready for the day each time with very little tears and a bag full of sunscreen and hats and cereal puffs and all other absolute necessities of life with a wee one.

And I was proud of the organizations and companies I have connections with, as they put their best faces forward for the world that walked by each day. But mostly, I was proud of our family, and the other families like us, pushing their strollers and loving each other just like all the other families around the world on a lovely late June weekend. There's not a thing that can tell me the pride I felt was somehow bad or shameful, because that doesn't make any sense at all, and never did, even in the days of plaid skirts and Peter Pan collars.

And what about the patience counseled by our President? I've got plenty to say about that too, but no energy to say it tonight. Tonight, I'm going to bed thinking how proud I am of my family, and every family like ours.

Tell It.

This weekend my family, like many others, headed out to spend some time with the rest of our clan. We went to Denver, where Mama Bear's brother lives with the sweetest little girl in the world, our niece, who was celebrating her one year birthday. We had a great time, especially at the birthday party, where I found myself drawn to the garage with the "men folk" who were drinking beer, watching Nascar and poking fun at each other. There, I met many new people, each of whom congratulated me on the Baby Bear. I found community with them, as the non-birth parent of a kiddo, and we bonded over the things that parents have in common...which is nearly everything, no matter whether they lie down at night with a person of their same or a different gender. Not a one of them blinked at the fact that Tommy had two mommies, nor did the many kids who were there. It just was a fact of life, despite the fact that we were the only two mommy family many of them have ever met.

While this scene was playing out across our country, the governor of Minnesota vetoed the "Safe Schools for All" bill, which simply sought to protect kids like my Baby Bear, kids who are different in some way (yes, including ones just like Baby Bear who have two moms, but also ones who have a disability, or ones who are immigrants to this country, or ones who have funny ears) from bullying. While I was finding community with people who are so different and yet so amazingly similar to me, my governor was reinforcing that my family, my amazing, gorgeous, remarkable son, was not worthy of protection.

And it may seem, from the scene at the birthday party, that perhaps the Safe Schools for All bill isn't necessary, when even Nascar loving, beer-drinking guys and their kids don't blink at a two mommy family. But sadly, we all know this isn't true. One needs only to look at recent news reports of children, babies really, killing themselves because kids "thought" they were gay to realize that this bill would have really meant something.

But our governor, for his own personal biased reasons, chose to veto something that the representatives of the people of Minnesota resoundingly approved. Maybe because the word "bully" (the bill was often referred to as "anti-bullying legislation") hit a bit too close to home for someone who used a holiday weekend to hide his cowardice. Or maybe because he's never shared a beer with two mommies, or looked at their son and realized our kiddo is no different than his kids, and worthy of all the same protection. For whatever reason, our governor doesn't get that. But I'm going to make damn sure that every person I get to share a beer or a kid story with from now on does.

As we enter the month of Pride, I will dedicate myself to coming out as lesbian parent EVERY CHANCE I GET. You should do the same.

Signs and Signals

Have you ever felt like someone is trying to tell you something, but you're just not sure of the message? Like it's on one of those radio stations that comes in as you're driving along the interstate: strong at one minute, fading the next, static often filling the space in between? I feel like I've been getting one of those rural radio messages this week, though I think I know where this one is coming from.

The first time I picked up the signal was this past week, when I watched my dear Mama Bear win a much-deserved award for the work she does. Her speech was amazing and inspiring, and the award hard-earned, the product of equal parts amazing work ethic, crazy determination and the strongest sense of justice I've ever witnessed. Though I didn't realize it then, I think that moment was the first time I came across this phantom station. Faint, full of static, but definitely noticeable.

The second and third times both happened today. Once when a colleauge told me about his relative, a young man in high school who, in an embodiment of bravery, came out to all of his friends and family at a party. At a time of year when things generally weigh heavy on my heart (my father's death, my estranged mother's birthday and my birthday all fall this month) this story brought so much joy to my day. The fact that my co-worker felt the same, and realized it would have this effect for me made it even sweeter. I often feel like such an outsider in the land of wedding pictures and marital privilege, that feeling completely connected to someone there was amazing.

The third event arrived even more unexpectedly, like when you lose a station and for some reason forget to tune to something else, and then suddenly, out of nowhere, the sound begins again a few miles down the road. Yeah, this was one of those kind of shocks. It happened as I was checking Facebook (because who knows how many important things happened between work and this evening) and it was, quite simply, one of the top three emails I've ever read. No amount of paraphrasing or explanation could do it justice, so I'm just pasting it below, with any identifying information omitted:

You may or may not remember me from...softball or the eight days that I spent at your college...but, you, I will never forget!

Years ago, my cousin told me that you came out to her. I was outwardly shocked, but inwardly relieved. At that point I knew that I would have to do the same sometime in the future, but I had never known another person that was gay and had no idea how to go about it. Thanks for making the world seem a little less scary.

How amazing is that? I mean really, just out of the blue, the nicest email I've ever read. Someone reaching out to say "thanks for making the word seem a little less scary." Because isn't that what we're all trying to do, especially once we become parents? Just make this place a little less scary for those coming after us?


Taken individually, each of these things would be nice, touching, maybe even worthy of a blog post on their own. But taken together? All three of these lined up in a row during this, the hardest week of every year? These are more than a coincidence or luck. These events were a signal, just as real as the station carrying bad country through the static in Missouri, Nebraska or Ohio. And I'm starting to get the message.

You see, when I came out those many years ago, when the news was spreading from cousin to cousin, and through the web of information in my hometown, that estranged mother of mine didn't take it very well. And my father, though he didn't take it so well at first, eventually came around, and had only one concern. "I just always hoped your life would be a little easier than mine" he once said "and knowing this, I just think it might not be." Years later, after he was gone, that estranged mother (for one of the reasons she's estranged) tried to tell me, in a letter of all places, that my father never was okay with me being gay, that he never truly accepted me or my life.

And if I didn't know then that she was wrong, I sure do now. That message arrived bit by bit since Saturday, and came in loud and clear today, and I know it came from my father. I know that the message I received from that long lost friend was really my dad's way of letting me know that he's aware, wherever he is, that things are okay, my life is a bit easier than his, and that, at least for some folks that have followed in my path, life is a little less scary.

Dear Mr. President

I've been doing a lot of thinking about the economy lately. We all have, thanks in no small part to the media. I don't blame them, I mean if I could get up everyday and write the same thing over and over, I'd likely do it too. So, we are bombarded with news of how bad the economy is, how low the Dow has fallen, and how yet another bank has taken our hard-earned bailout money and used it to throw a party on the moon.

But all this noise that passes for news has me thinking about a time many years ago, when I wasn't much older than Baby Bear, and my father lost his job. It was the last time that bad news dominated our airwaves, though I don't remember hearing about it quite so much, except in certain places, like family events at my father's union hall, and in hushed tones in my childhood kitchen. But it happened, just as it happened to lots of other families, particularly families like ours, solidly blue collar and lower middle class, living in Southwestern Pennsylvania.

At the time I had a Fisher Price record player, and a number of 45s that looking back seemed a bit mature for my young ears. But one tiny record in particular has come to mind a lot lately, and try as I might to find more information about it on the vast expanse of the internet, I'm afraid I'm the only person who remembers it. The song was called, I believe, "Dear Mr. President" and was written from the point of view of a man, not unlike my father, who had lost his job. To this day I remember many of the words, and can even recall the tune, which I find interesting when so many other things from even more recently are lost in my memory.

"I've got payments on my house, payments on my car, and the unemployment checks now they don't seem to go that far. Every thing I worked for, well it seemed to slip away, I don't think I'll get my benefits, my compensation pay. I got a wife and three children, depending on this man. I got a government in Washington that does not give a damn. So please Mr. President, won't you Mr. President, open up the steel mills for me."

Granted my father hadn't worked in a steel mill. He worked at a factory though, making, if I recall correctly, grates for industrial furnaces. but the song still rang so close to our family situation (minus two of the three kids) that I played it over and over again on that Fisher Price phonograph.

I don't think that children's record player was meant to handle such weighty tunes, just the way a child of my age wasn't meant to carry such a heavy burden. But we both did, and the economy continued its slide, and I went on to march with my father in a number of Labor day parades, chanting even more grown up phrases like "Reagan, Reagan he's no good, send him back to Hollywood" and "One, two, three, four, out the door in '84."


By '84, however, I was 8 years old. Far older and wiser, I had outgrown my childish records, and my father, due entirely to the generosity of one of my playmates' fathers, had a new job. But we still marched. We marched for my father's fellow union members, who hadn't had the same luck as him, and we marched because we believed, truly believed, that this country could be far better than the awful news cycle we had found ourselves in. And we still chanted, because we knew those chants, like the songs on my record player, gave others hope that they were not alone.

So these days, as I listen to the endless drone of bailout and foreclosure noise, I remember my father. And my records, and those early years of worry. And I thank my lucky stars, and my father (not The Father, but my father, the one who made those furnace grates) for all his hard work and sacrifice that allow me to hear the noise this time, but not absorb it.

But lest my father be reading this from wherever he is, don't worry Dad. I still remember the lessons learned from that record player, and those early days, and I'll always remember the words to those songs and chants. So no matter how nice Baby Bear and Mama Bear and I may have it, we'll always vote and fight like you taught me.

UPDATE: One of my amazing friends (who is a librarian...shout out to librarians!) helped me figure out the song title, which led me to this - a YouTube video of someone playing the 45. It was amazing for me to hear this after all these years. Hope you enjoy it:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aka2CGafYsM

Inauguration Day

I suspect that today will be one of the few days in my life that I will be able to remember every thing I did. There are a few other days that are like that...September 11th, the day my Dad passed away, the day we found out we had a Baby Bear on the way....the day he got here. But today was even better, because it was the first indelible memory that involved our entire family.

Today was the day America inaugurated our first African-American President, the day that I hope we will be able to look back and say was the beginning of a new way for our country. It was a day that made me think that my son's generation, the kids who won't remember today but will have pictures and websites and videos to prove they were there, is going to be alright.

It gave me hope that maybe when our little Baby Bear grows up, that Mamas like me won't have to wait 6 months to have their names added to their children's birth certificates (and then only by court order that I won't really believe is coming until I have it in my hand). Hope that families like ours won't face the problem friends of ours recently had, realizing that although the company they work for offers medical benefits to same-sex partners, they have to pay for them after tax (just to make sure they didn't go thinking their relationship was equal or anything). And hope that some day, our little Baby Bear will be able to see his Mamas get married.

But for now, I have a real feeling of hope and positivity for this year. In a few weeks, Mama Bear's family, my in-laws and her sister-in-law, and Baby Bear's cousin, will all come to town to celebrate with us when I get that long-awaited court order and become his legal Mommy. That is going to be amazing and fabulous and so very meaningful, not because of the court decision, or even my name on his birth certificate (if any family realizes that a piece of paper does not a relationship make, it's one that has two mommies). No, it's not because of that at all, but simply because we will be living in a country that believed things should be a bit more fair, a bit more equal, a bit brighter and more hopeful, and then went out and made that happen.

And also, and more importantly, it will be because for the first time in my life, I will have a family standing behind me when something important happens, and they will all be happy for me and my loved ones simply because they love us. Nothing is better than that, and I can't wait.

The Day After

It has been nearly a decade since I have felt this good on a day after a Presidential election. Four years ago I was dumbstruck, and four years before that I was still waiting for results. But this year, tired as I am after an early Tuesday morning of election protection volunteering, I feel hopeful about this country, and confident that the first president elected during my son's life will be one who deeply cares about the issues that will face my little man.

But I feel hopeful for another reason, not just because of the election of Barack Obama, not just because of the amazing number of young black men I saw leaving suburban polling places yesterday and proudly affixing their "I voted" sticker to their chest, not just because of the amazing outpouring of happiness I saw all over this nation last night.

I feel hopeful also because last night, in his first speech as President-Elect, despite the hateful ballot measures passing in CA, FL, AZ and AR, our next President included "gay and straight" in his litany of the different folks who came together and demanded change. And the words rolled off his tongue more easily than I have ever heard from any politician, save maybe for a few of our local greats here in Minnesota.

I feel hopeful because he said it, and included us, and has brought so many people together that I believe he can do the same for families like mine, for people like me, and for those who fear my family. Because I know it can only be fear that makes people feel that they should have the power to prevent me from commiting myself in front of my family, my friends, and my God (in whatever form my God may take), to the mother of my child, my best friend, my partner for life and beyond. And I know it can only be fear that caused the voters of Arkansas to decide that two otherwise completely qualified hopeful parents should be prevented from adopting or fostering a child who needs a home simply because those parents happen to be of the same gender.

I am hopeful President Obama can bring about a time when my infant son does not have to worry about someone else deciding that his family, his mommies, are such a threat that discrimination against them needs to be codified as the law of the land. I am hopeful we will see that day, and that it will be in Tommy's lifetime. And I believe it will, because America is a different place now than it was 10, 20, 30 years ago, and I am hopeful it will be even more different, even better, even fairer for all families and all children, in the future.

So if you have that same hope, please vow to continue this fight for a fairer America. We're on our way, but we're not entirely there yet.

Our Village

I don't know who first coined the phrase "it takes a village to raise a child," though I know it was the title of a book by Hillary Clinton. I'm not sure of the source, and don't want to attract throngs of Clinton-haters to this blog (though don't worry, I don't kid myself that the throngs will ever arrive...) so I'll just say, I don't know who said it, but it is so so true.

Our Baby Bear isn't even here yet and I already realize how true that statement is. We have so many amazing friends and family members already willing to pitch in and help. Aunties T and B cleaned our house better than it's ever been this weekend, part of their gift to us for the birth (one whole YEAR of cleanings, one a month, for Baby Bear's first year). Grandma Bear arrived Sunday and has been SUCH a help so far, getting Mama Bear focused on birth stuff, making delicious dinners and just providing an extra set of hands around the house. And the list goes on and on.

Not a day goes by where one of our friends doesn't drop a note in my inbox or call on the phone and ask "is there anything we can do?" And the amazing part is, they really mean it. We have some soups already on their way to our freezer, offers to mow the lawn and walk the dog, offers for emergency babysitting...the list goes on and on.

And you know what? I think we have so much support because of who we are. I don't mean "who we are" like "Oh, Mama Bear and Butch Mama are SOOO cool and great that people fall all over themselves to help out." No, that's not what I mean at all. We have so much support because we are lesbians. I am sure of this. Here's why: I think women in general are better at offering help and knowing what needs to be done, especially around new baby arrivals. AND, I think our community in general (the greater GLBT, not just lesbians) helps each other out more - the whole idea of chosen family.

I feel blessed right now, even as we discover a few instances where folks we thought would be helpful are decidedly not (I won't name names, but boy, it's a doozy). I feel blessed to have helpful folks to compare those people with to be able to say "Nope, you don't measure up, you're out of the chosen family."

And right now, even as I read things that anti-gay marriage or family folks publish or say, I'm not as angry anymore. Now, those statements just make me feel pity for those folks, because they will never know the joy of chosen family like we do, and their kids will never grow up with this many loving caring individuals around them.

Now if only I could feel pity for those folks who remained nameless up above...the non-helpfuls. The ex-family members. I'm trying, but....nope, not there yet. Still just angry. I'll keep trying though....

Ready or Not, Here He Comes!

I'm not sure that this blog should start yet, as the true reason for it won't be here for at least a few more weeks, but I'm still typing, so I guess it will, whether I'm sure or not. That's quite an apt way to start for this subject, since our family is about to change in much the same way. Here he comes, ready or not. I suppose I should explain all of this, lest this blog become some sort of Virgina Woolf "To the Lighthouse"-esque in media res exercise in literary devices. (Ohhh, I love it when that English major my father found questionable comes in handy for sentences like that!!) So without further ado, it begins....

I am a soon to be lesbian mama of what I suspect will be a brutally handsome baby boy. I suspect this, because my partner, who we will call Mama Bear, is, quite honestly, the must beautiful and glowing pregnant woman ever, save for possibly the Virgin Mary. (Before you get all up in arms and suspect I am some Bible-thumping homo, you should know something. I'm a recovering Catholic-14 years clean-but some old habits die hard, so when I refer to all things Catholic, know that it is not in any sort of devout way). Mama Bear resembles one particular old-time movie beauty, and has an amazing laugh and perfectly proportioned features, so I'm glad she's donating half of her DNA to this fellow, because he's bound to be a heartbreaker.

But let's get back to the point, shall we? And that point was me. Me, the most amazingly lucky dyke, who in a few weeks will get to see Mama Bear bring this little man into our home, and watch as her pregnancy glow changes into the glow of a thoroughly exhausted but, I suspect, ecstatically happy new Mama Bear.

So our family is about to change in ways I'm sure we can't even imagine. Or might not want to. Or may be unable to due to some survival instinct adaptation of the species that won't let you know what you're in for, because if you did no one would ever give birth. Who knows, but I do know it's about to change.

This weekend, however, is Pride, and Mama Bear and I have a lot to be proud of. We've both overcome a fair number of obstacles in our day, and have both worked hard to get to a place where we enjoy our jobs (most days) and are doing something we each love. We have some great pets and a great family on the Bear side, despite what that Goldilocks story may have you believe. We have a great home that we will actually own in 28 or so years (why do people say they own their homes? No you don't, the bank owns your home, you rent from the bank), and on many days, that home is filled with friends and neighbors that we love like family.

All in all, we have a lot to be proud of, but this will be the last year we are not "proud parents." It's strange and wonderful and exciting and scary and crazy-making to contemplate that, especially given that I often feel as if college was yesterday and that someone should really be paying closer attention to me, lest I hurt myself. But, someone, somewhere, saw fit to send those $300+ per vial sperm hurtling into Mama Bear's egg about 9 months ago, so we'll be the ones paying attention quite soon.

I don't know what I intend to do with this blog, but I feel like it's important to get thoughts and pictures all together some place, so that this little man can someday look and know how very much he is loved. Some of my own larger obstacles grew from a place of not knowing that, so this guy, my guy, is going to know that better than anything, and starting even now, before he confirms that handsomeness that I know is on the way. So, sit back and get ready, because things are about to change, ready or not.