Beware Garage Sale Sizes

I picked up this night shirt at a friend's garage sale.

It is sized 18 months.

I put it on him the night before and, because it had been so difficult to get over his head and through one arm, I figured that I had two choices:

1. remove the shirt from head and arm or

2. go ahead and stretch it on to the other arm avoiding the fight for the next day when he wouldn't be so tired.

I know jammies are supposed to be tight, but a sausage they are not supposed to resemble!

Whose Birthday Is It Anyway?

Mother of Four mentioned to 3of4 that it was the SYO's Mom's birthday and that they'd be heading down to our place for some ice cream cake.

Which one?

Which Mom?

Yeah. The one who works, or the one who rides her bike?

Irregular Newsletter: Almost Eight Months

You are nearly eight months old now.

Since my last newsletter, two months ago, you have changed so much, again. The speed of your development amazes me. And, what's more, not only are you changing and growing, but once you've acquired a new skill, it is seems as though you pack it neatly under your belt, never forgetting, always improving on it.

This is definitely unlike myself. I will learn some econometric technique, use it several times for a project. Then, months later come back to it, and it will seem foreign to me as though I am meeting a person for the first time. Not even remembering the face and forgetting the name.

You are amazing that way, Big.

Since my last newsletter you seem practically all grown. Headed off to college.

You finally learned to coordinate your arms and legs to the point of ambulation (on knees) across a flat plane last weekend while we were at the North Shore with MRM#1 and MRM#2. As the SYO enjoyed High School Musical for the 18th time in a row, we let you "vocalize" your way to mastery. Heretofore, you had only been able to get on your hands and knees, rocking your way to frustrated oblivion and a degree of vocalization that I, while alone with you, could not fully absorb. Usually, I would rescue you from your misery and wisk you off to your preferred destination. With the help of three other adults, though, we let you frustrate yourself to mastery.

This, of course, has changed our lives dramatically. You and your unpredictable ways can now be found in odd corners of the rooms after only brief moments out of the room to, perhaps, urinate, for example.

Childproofing has recommenced at a more vigorous pace.

When you're tired, and it is close to bedtime, your vocalizations seem to become more poignant. It is as though you're saying: I know that I'm off to bed now, so let me be more direct with you. To be sure that you understand what I am saying: BABABABABABABA! or MAMAMAMAMAMAMA!

You have inadvertently chosen to vocalize the names we're planning on calling ourselves. But we don't care. We pretend that you know what you're doing all the same, oohing and ahhing back at you. I sometimes respond with a chorus of "Barbara Ann" by the Beach Boys because of it's "BA - BA - BA" lyrics.

We're also learning a little more about your personality.

I would characterize you as, well, as aggressive. I have four empirical observations to support this conclusion.

1. BioMom said that after nipping her n*#$@le, you laughed. Hard.

2. I have observed you grabbing at our littlest cat's hair and pull it. Hard. Afer she cries out and wrangles herself away from your tiny vice grip, you then chase after her, black hairs poking from between your tight-fisted fingers, on your hands and knees, giggling all the while.

3. Snap the bow of my favorite glasses on one single twist, and then laugh when I responded with a resounding "NO!" (Running tally of costs due to your shenanegans: $70).

and

4. Persist on rolling over, head butting, putting your mouth all over, grabbing the hair of, and squeezing the face of a baby about your age who was visiting the other night.

You definitely know your own name, but I'm not sure that you recognize any other specific form of our language, or the two ASL words I've been using with you regularly: "milk" and "more".

You're eating loads of stuff now, but wanting a small, rare fillet. I can barely carry you in the Bjorn and, in fact, bought one with more back support as a birthday gift for myself.

When we go to get you from your crib first thing in the morning, or after any of your naps, you wrap your arms around our necks, squeezing, and your little mouth, open and wet, searches our face in your wild form of a kiss, as if to say: OH! It's YOU! I missed you so much! I'm so glad you're here!

You make me laugh. Hard. Deep belly laughs that warm me up and make everything else just roll off my back.

Thank you again, sweet potato.

Another North Shore Perspective: Our More (ahem) Tasteful Version of Hooters?

On the way home from the North Shore this past weekend, we stopped at our usual haunt, the New Scenic Cafe.

This place is unusual not only in its amazing menu and simultaneously kid-friendly yet still elegant atmosphere. Every single time we go (nearly twice per year), the place is stocked with a new crop of funky, easy-on-the-eyes, woman-friendly female waitstaff.

Our travel companions noted our observance of this unusual phenomenon.

Duluth isn't San Fransisco. Or New York. Or Austin. Or even Minneapolis for that matter, so we're always surprised at that place. Where do they get these girls?

The North Shore Perspectives

An Academic Justification for Blogging

Brad DeLong makes a great case for blogging in the Chronicle of Higher Education. By the title, I expected him to reference Dooce. Given the personal nature of my blog, I think I'll still avoid sending a link to my deans.

See the article: Can Blogging Derail Your Career?: The Invisible College.

A Unique Explanation for the Wage Gap

Taggert, over at A Random Walk sent me this link:

Does menstruation explain the gender pay gap?

I'd like to look at the results of this study more closely. How, for example, do they measure "menstrual cycles"? And, if they are comparing men and women, doesn't this just proxy for sex? I suppose it would be interesting to compare women's bargaining ability at different stages of their cycle.

Two Things Seen and Heard

The following two things were either seen or heard at our little homestead over the past couple of days.

Thing One: The SYO abruptly leaves the room in which we were both hanging out. No less than 30 seconds later, I heard: Mama? What was I doing in here?

Thing Two: During a sink-bath, Big began urnating a steady fountain-like upward stream. While doing so, apparently recognizing a little game that I play with him using either the water spigot or some of his dinosaur bath toys that spray out of their mouths, he makes an attempt to grab at his pee-stream with his newly discovered pincer grasp*!

Thank goodness he has not yet reached the next developmental milestone: "Once your baby perfects grasping, throwing isn't far behind, so watch out. Many babies enjoy hurling their toys and having you pick them up."


*A developmental milestone which lets him pick up small objects such as beads between his thumb and forefinger.

There Is No Place Like Nebraska

My Whiskey Tango Moment(s)

I got to meet LesbianDad last night at a reading for the book Confessions of The Other Mother! I really appreciate her beginning attempts at creating a space and language for the kind of parents that we are -- somewhere between dad and mom.

In practice, however, my particular form of fatherhood unfortunately seems to resemble my own father's rather than what LesbianDad calls "the best of a dad and the best of a mom."

I call this perversion, the "1950s Lesbian Dad." [Let me clarify: My dad was an older dad for me. He and Mom had my brothers when they were 19 years old in 1944, and then, well, I guess you could call me an "accident", but I came along 25 years later. Let's just say that the pill wasn't 97% effective in 1969.]

Alas, we all have our own "worst parenting moments."

This one, for me, occurred at the culmination of what felt like (and actually became) the longest drive home. BioMom and I have vowed now to never drive long distances during the day again. Ever. Big just refuses to miss ANYTHING! Sleep? Why? I might miss something! I wish I could still enjoy the nuances of the Iowa landscape to that degree.

I think he slept to twenty minute naps during the entire 8 hour (which should have been 5.5 hour) drive.

As a result, we stopped many, MANY times.

During the last stop, only about an hour to our destination, we found ourselves at the infamous Dairy Queen.

So, picture this: Dairy Queen in rural America during the vacation months. Not just that, it wasn't JUST a Dairy Queen. . . It was a Braissere! It was that greasy, dirty combination of fries and cream with the floors that simultaneously slip AND slide. At one point Big spit up about a gallon of formula on the floor while I was trying to wear him out walking about the place. Let's just say that when I went to clean it up, I couldn't tell where he had actually spit up.

You get the picture.

Of course, though, all of this did not diminish our appetites. I order a Dilly Bar and BioMom orders the SYO a small cone, and herself a medium cone.

As though arguing in front of a judge and jury, the SYO begins making her case about the degree of unfairness at getting the smaller of the two cones.

Why do I get a small?

No response.

Why do you get a big one?

No response.

That's not FA-IR! (Note the word became two syllables.)

This goes on and on, the SYO meandering through all imaginable permutations of the argument.

I then make the mistake of getting involved.

Mom gets a bigger one because she is bigger than you.

But that's not FA-IR!!!

Seeing that the fair argument is getting her nowhere, she moves on to the next tactic. While holding her own cone (now actually larger than BioMom's because she's been arguing rather than eating and because BioMom has been focusing on the opposite) in her left hand, she says to BioMom:

Can I have a bite?

No response.

Can I have some of your's?

You know, you really should share!!!

Again, this goes on and on.

I think the SYO was also just having fun. Will this button get a reaction? No. How about THIS one?

She knows that this completely pushes my buttons -- asking for more of something when you have some of it in your own hand.

I snap:

SHUH-UHT UH-HUHP!!! (Note the four syllable pronunciation).

I told the SYO to "shut up" in a DQ in rural Minnesota.

Seriously.

Both BioMom and the SYO stop, mid-lick, and look at me in shock.

Hell, I look at myself in shock.

The only thing I could do at that point is take myself out of the scene. I start walking away and hear:

You can't say that to me!!

Note: I did, later apologize to her.

Bertie's Birdbath

One afternoon last week, while on our way home from Cousin's brother's pool, the SYO wondered aloud how I knew where I was going and if we were lost.

Cousin had taken her youngest home earlier for a nap and we were lucky enough to have the star sleeper in town (Big), who took a nice nap in the pack and play while we lingered in the pool with the 105 degree sun at our backs. Without her to follow home, the SYO figured that we would not be able to find our way back.

How do you know where you are going?

She wondered.

I had, in fact grown up in Omaha, and we were not far from my old digs at that point.

Do you want to see the house where I grew up?

I wondered.

Cousin and I grew up about a block away from each other and the SYO was aware of the local lore.

YEAH! I wanna see the big hill you had to walk up to visit each other.

I'd given her the old -- it was up hill BOTH ways -- thing.

We drove slowly past my old house.

It has changed a lot. The crab apple tree that I used to climb out front has been cut down, there is a fence around the yard. The pairs of evergreens that cornered the backyard, creating the best hideaways beneath and between them for little summer daydreamers had obviously also passed on.

But I noticed one steadfast landmark: my mother's birdbath.

Images from my childhood-real and imagined in that way that our mind lets us incorporate old photographs that we've seen a hundred times into our memory as though we actually remember the moment the image was taken-flashed before my eyes:




We drove away, but I was obsessed with the birdbath for the next several days.

My mom died when I was nine, and that house held a lot of memories for me. Plus, I only have a few things of hers, so I felt like an archaeologist who had just excavated the missing link. Had I discovered one of the last remaining vestiges of my mother?

I imagined her moving in to the new house, and with her love of birds (hence the apropo shortening of her name, "Alberta" to the nickname "Bertie") putting up a birdhouse and birdbath. I imagined her painstakingly choosing among many birdbaths, and then the decision about where in the yard it would live.

In fact, I did not even know if she had actually put it there.

Had it been in the back yard when they moved in?

I interrogated my aunt (Cousin's mom): Do you remember it? Did she put it there? Was it hers?

Maybe I was justifying ownership. Reparations if you will.

In any case, she, nor any of her sons (my older cousins) even remembered its existence (I did not have the above pictures as evidence with me). But this fact only fueled my obsession: if they did not remember it, then she SURELY put it there, no? Or, maybe it was so consistent with her landscape that it did not stand out for them, the way it did for me.

Plus, if I remembered correctly, it was made of concrete, and it had obviously not moved in nearly 30 years. If someone could move it, wouldn't they have? Now that the trees were gone, it seemed absurdly far away from the corner of the fence. I'm sure I have changed everything about the landscape of our own backyard. My fingers have touched everything, making claim on all parts of our scenery.

It MUST have been her doing, since it was in the exact same position I remembered it so long ago.

Discussions about the method of acquisition ensued.

Cousin felt that it was my due.

BioMom felt that taking it would be unethical.

Cousin's brothers still didn't belive it existed.

Cousin's mom thought we should offer the current residents some cash in exchange for the birdbath.

The house itself has a rather well-known tragedy associated with it. One that any Omahaian of the early 1970s would be well aware of, were they given a little nudge to remind them. I imagined ringing the doorbell and inquiring after the birdbath, reminding them that I was the one-year-old in the house at the time.

This was a rather manipulative approach, and it also felt quite risky to me. What if they said "No"? Stealing would be an inadequate alternative in the wake of such a rejection.

In the end, Cousin, fortified with some liquid courage, talked me into taking the (ahem) road less traveled.

Under the cover of darkness (and a black shirt that her husband loaned me) we went back to the scene of our childhood and attempted to retreive my mom's birdbath.

We had it all worked out -- park the car far away. . . Enter through the back yard neighbor's. . . replace the birdbath with a newer version.

We did not expect the friendly, but loquacious dog.

No steaks or large bones were in sight.

In the end, we got away only with the top portion.

Biomom's response: YOU'VE GOT TO GO BACK AND GET THE BASE!

I unloaded it from the car yesterday and, in all of it's old, cracked glory, I am in love with it, and feel like I have a piece of my mom here with me in Minnesota.

Academic Freedom?

If we were in person, I'd tell you this story, and put the Academic Freedom part in, what Dane Cook calls "rock star quotes".

I swiped the link from Dooce's husband, but it's good. . . Well, interesting. . . No, scary. . . No, telling. . . in any case:

BYU professor looses job for disagreeing with the Mormon Church's recent gay marriage amendment.

What should we call that, instead of getting "Dooced" (neologism: to be "dooced" is to lose your job as a result of something you wrote in an online journal)?

Maybe he got "Goosed"? (Substitute G from Gay for the D in Dooced).

We're still here in Red-State-ville.

It has been absolutely lovely. Big has been a trooper, sleeping like he's never slept in his life. I think it's the big-sky fresh air, the plethora of crazy kids, and the non-stop playing we've been doing.

Today, there was a moment when all four kids currently en-residence were simultaneously asleep!

Ahhhhhhh!

On Holiday

We're heading to visit Cousin et al. today!

Hopefully it'll go well. Big isn't as flexible as the SYO was/is. On the Fourth, he refused to sleep, basically.

I suppose noone can refuse to sleep for a week!

King of Destruction

So, we are seeing some glimpses into the future of Big's personality.

The other morning, with the SYO at grandma's on an over night (did I mention how cool my MIL is?) BioMom and I listened to Big chatter away in his crib.

He was doing great and we were just enjoying our slow wake-up.

When we went into their room, this is what we saw:






The mobile that you see in pieces around him was from Cousin. . . Intact.

So much for having a products liability lawyer for a mom. . . I'm sure that one of those labels reads:

WARNING! NOT TO BE USED WITHOUT SUPERVISION!!

Vacation All I Ever Wanted

So the SYO and Big have the greatest grandma.

And she doesn't even know the URL for this blog, so this post is not just sucking up to the MIL.

Every week or so the SYO gets a letter in the mail from said grandma. Lately, it has contained this cool thing from their local rag. Every week the rag publishes two very similar photos. The purpose is to identify the 8 or so differences in the second photo as compared to the first.

We LOVE this game. The are very subtle differences and often I have to look at the clues before finding all 8 differences.

The most recent photos were of two kids in the back of a car clearly loaded for the family vacation.

On the sheet grandma had sribbled a little note that went something like this:

[SYO], I think that this week's is easier than last's. What do you think? Have a great vacation!

A couple of mornings later I found myself wondering what she meant by "Have a great vacation!" We aren't really going on vacation any time soon, although we are heading to visit Cousin et al. Her sister is coming in from Greece for the month with her family and we haven't seen them in years. But I wouldn't exactly call that a "vacation" in the strictest sense of the word. . .

Was she sad that we were going out of town? That she wouldn't see the kids for a few days?

I wondered this aloud to BioMom and the SYO one morning as we were waking up slowly, the boy in the bed and the girl in the rocker, reading.

Me: What do you think Grandma meant by "Have a great vacation!" on the puzzle she sent.

SYO: Oh! That was a little "joke". . . [She actually put her fingers up in the universal sign for quotation marks] . . . You know. . . VACATION . . . like the kids in the picture.
She said this matter-of-factly.

BIOMOM: What little note?

This simple interaction goes a long way in exemplifying the intricacies of each of our personalities. Me, aware of the little communication, but unable to identify the subtle humor; SYO aware and in complete understanding; BIOMOM oblivious despite the fact that she had focused competely on finding all 8 discrepancies with the SYO.

!

Houdini

I wonder if the act of resistance is, somehow, inherent in all sentient beings.

The SYO and I often get into little battles that bring to mind something I learned in the one judo class I had in college: that it takes effort on both sides to hold up a wall. In other words, if one person were to stop resisting, pushing, whatever, the wall falls.

Note: this may be an obvious lesson to the more mature parent.

I was surprised, though, to see how fast Big learned the art of resistance, and have come to wonder if it is some sort of survival instinct ingrained in us.

Putting pants on his chubby little thighs sometimes becomes a battle of gladiatorial proportions. To do so, I first get one pantleg all ready. Like a woman putting on nylons, rolling them down to the toe and then carefully pulling upward so as not to put a run in the hose. Once I switch to the other leg, I'm doomed as his little wheels kick and drag as if he were attempting to treadwater in the midst of a hurricane. No matter what attempts I make with my paltry two hands to keep the one leg on while putting on the other, he nearly always wins and wins big. Not only does he get the original off, but more often than not, he dismisses any progress I've made on the second leg with a little half-smirk and a giggle as if to say in his best "W":

BRING IT ON!

The Dialectic of Parent Names

The other day in the car, Cousin's four-year-old boy asked me:

[Blogauthor], are you a 'Mom' or a 'Dad'?

He had been curious about this issue during the past week asking questions along the same lines such as:

Does [SYO] have a 'Dad'?

Hegel's dialectic would serve me well here. If "mother", for example, is the thesis, creating its antithesis, "father", this results in a synthesis of the opposing assertions or "at least a qualitative transformation in the direction of the dialogue."

I just finished Polly Pagenhart's essay "Confessions of a Lesbian Dad" in the recently published edited volume Confessions of the Other Mother.

It was excellent.

LesbianDad: Email me when you get a chance. I can't find a way to communicate with you directly, but I'd like to express to you that we seem to be living paralell lives in many ways.

Anyway.

She tells a story toward the end of the essay in which her nephews inquired as to the status of her parenthood in a manner similar to Cousin's boy:

"So, Polly? Are you going to be a mama or a papa?"

I had read this essay only a couple of nights before I was posed with the same question and so it was only out of respect that I essentially plagiarized her answer (I must say that I have never been asked that particular question before. Sure, I've gotten the "are you a boy or a girl" from the curious toddler, but never the Mom/Dad question. In fact, I've mostly had the "Mom" label plastered on me out of politically correct sympathizers--especially since Big was born and, especially on Mother's day).

I'm going to be a little of both

These were Polly's words. Early blueprints for our non-biological lesbian parenting handbook in the making.

Something other than mother, but other than father too. I'll be the best parts of a mama, plus the best parts of a papa. Which, is called a baba.

I held my breath and drove us the rest of the way home.

Kids at Kamp

With the big kids off at day camp, Cousin and I, left with the little ones who a) don't talk and b) take regular naps, are enjoying a bit of respite.

Of course, when they come home exhausted, starving, cranky, filthy, and finding it irresistable not to push each other's buttons, we pay for it in spades.

But the quiet, in the meantime, is lovely.

Big's Bi-Annual Newsletter

In following the footsteps of another, more ambitious blogger, with her "Monthly Newsletters" to her little one, I decided that at this six month mark--this strange place where we have a six month old, a six year old, and, of course, it being the sixth month of the sixth year--well, all the stars seems to have come into place for me to write such a newsletter. So, here goes.

Bi-Annual Newsletter No. 1*

You're sleeping-in right now, Big. Its a thing that we hoped would happen because we're a sleeping-in sort of family. 8:36 a.m. and you're snoozing away. I see you turn your head and wrinkle up your face once in a while and I think that maybe you're about to wake up, but then you roll over again and drop back into the subliminal.

Let's see. How do I summarize the last six months? Impossible, and now I'm regretting not incorporating the Monthly Newsletter into my blogging repertoire.

Weeks One and Two: Once BioMom got out of bed from the C-Section, we were up and running and you were the sweetest, smallest thing. At first, your face was so serious, and you would look suspiciously back and forth with your eyes as if you were just airlifted into Lebanon on some Mission Impossible quest saying to yourself "Okay, am on the ground, orienting myself to the surroundings. WHOA! Who are these HUGE people in my face? Where the hell am I?"

BioMom and I really took advantage of the time together--she with her FMLA leave, and me, conveniently, between semesters--to enjoy you and each other. It was wonderful. We oooed and aahhhed at you. We went out for lunch. We saw movies. Oh, we saw movies. For the first time, both of us were truly ready to watch the Oscars. Your first movie ever was Brokeback Mountain. I was so worried that we'd ruin the movie for everyone else that I could barely concentrate, focusing on your needs and making sure you were comfortable and quiet. During the "I can't quit you" scene, I was in the bathroom, changing your diaper. But I didn't care.

Weeks Three through Fourteen: Collic sets in. Between the crying, the books about sleep that BioMom was devouring and a self-esteem rocking failed interview process that I went through that month, we're just lucky we survived.

Months Four to Now: It feels like we got out of this strange black hole. As the doctor reminded us: It is YOU that remembers the collic. HE doesn't.

You are a "normal" kid now. You smile and giggle like crazy. You adore your big sister and literally light up when she walks in the room. In just the last two weeks you have:

grown two teeth
begun to roll over both ways at will
sit--sort of
learned to fall asleep on your own
begun to take long morning and afternoon naps
smile when we put you in your crib
learned to push the musak button in your crib
begun to REALLY sleep through the night
learned to squeel like a baby eagle when you're happy
tried: rice cereal, potatoes, sweet potatoes, broccoli, carrots, oatmeal and . . . watermelon!

You love to play. Especially at your sister's soccer games where I sit with you on my lap with someone rolling a ball in your general direction. With my hands over yours we hit the ball back and you burst with laughter every time you "hit" or kick it back.

Sometimes, while giving you your bottle, your eyes close drowsily and you reach up with your free hand and explore my face as if it were a message in braille. This melts my heart. I can't tell if you're doing it to a) see if I am still there, b) to explore me or c) because you're bored and in need of constant stimulation. In any case, it is darling. In any case, the message would read, I'm here for you sweet-potato. Not going anywhere.

You seem to have an unusual penchant for words with the hard "c" or "k" sound like "kick." And you have a deep little giggle that squirts out of you when we say them: Heh. Heh heh heh.

BioMom and I have officially traded places in terms of being the full-time breadwinner/caregiver, and it wasn't an easy transition. In fact, we're still navigating our unforeseen-expectations potholes. But so far, it has been incredible to get to know you so well and be so close to you. Given my life history, I am not one to take things for granted, but as far as this time is concerned, I approach with heightened awareness of its fleeting nature and with the knowledge that you are the first and last baby that I will care for from day "one". This is to say that given the stroller or the Bjorn, I'll take the Bjorn until my back gives out with your weight any day just to be that close to you.

You're beginning to grunt now in your unique vernacular that tells me that you're awake and open for business. So, I'll close for now. The past six months, while not the most challenging of my life, have been some of the most rewarding, interesting, and refreshing. Thank you.



*Caveat: Despite the hopeful title, this may or may not be followed up with another Newsletter at 1 year or sooner.

Happy Half Mr. Big!

Cousin and I decorated this lime chiffon cake (from this month's Cooking Light if you're interested) with blueberries and mint sprigs after a glass (or two) of wine.

Needless to say, we weren't very centered either.

Bending Beckham

Feingold: My Hero

Senate Rebuffs Same-Sex Marriage Ban

"All over the country, married heterosexual couples are shaking their heads and wondering how exactly the prospect of gay marriage threatens the health of their marriages," said Senator Russell D. Feingold, Democrat of Wisconsin.

Sperm Regulation?

See this this interesting New York Times article, As the Use of Donor Sperm Increases, Secrecy Can Be a Health Hazard by Denise Grady.

For Cousin

Can't wait to see you all on Thursday!!

Q & A

BioMom is out for the evening (some moms at the SYO's school are hosting a fundraiser: Mommy's Margarita Night), and the SYO and Mr. Big are snoozing it up in the other room.

Ahhhhh.

I was just poking around some of the GLBT Blogger Day's blogs and ran across this story over at Two Real Mama's.

I always forget about the healing nature of commiserating (and that reminds me to go out and get the book Confessions of the Other Mother for more of the same).

Two related notes.

The first relates to the event at which BioMom is currently enjoying. Due to some unexplained tipping point, we became overwhelmed with the following question:

We see that you only bought one ticket to the event. WHICH ONE OF YOU WILL ATTEND???

It was actually very sweet and all in good nature. We wondered if people were just curious. Or trying to be politically correct. BioMom wondered if it was an ice-breaking conversation for people who didn't know each other: Which 'mom' gets to go to the mom's night out???

Mr. Big and I went to an end-of-school picnic for the SYO today and we were confronted again by the hosts of the event: Why don't you come too???

I insisted that BioMom enjoys her time away.

I tried to explain that we do a sort of Mom/Dad thing. . . That it wasn't my sort of event anyway.

I don't think they really got it.

The second related note has to do with the questions people are willing to ask. I guess this is more related to the Two Real Moms post. The other day I was at the local corner grocer. The little store that has four isles; just enough room for the preservative-laden essentials.

Anyway, the guy at the register with whom I am not on a first-name basis but have seen on many occasions (the SYO, when she was a FYO used to go in and get bubble gum on a regular basis after preschool) notices the new baby (he's hard to miss):

You had another one?

Yeah!

Awkwardly: Um. Are you the lesbian?

He actually said "the". I'm not making that up.

Um. Yeah. I am.

So, um. Can I ask you a personal question?

You can imagine the rest of the conversation.

Its the same sort of thing. I got no creepy vibe from this guy. Just curiosity. It is not offensive in the least. Just a bit awkward and strange. Like those people that ask: Is he yours? A question that often catches in my throat. Yes! Um. No. Um. Sort of. Um, well, to the extent that anyone is anyone else's. . . ?

The best was the interaction I had with the grocery ladies (a different grocery store than the one mentioned above). Background: the first time I brought in Mr. Big, they asked if he was mine and then I had to go into the explanation about why they hadn't seen me pregnant in the weeks leading up to the obvious recent birth (BioMom rarely does the grocery shopping, and we even more rarely go together). Anyway, the other day I went in with Mr. Big strapped into the Bjorn. The gals went on and on about how much he looks like me.

?

Incoming: Tooth No.1

Blogging for LGBT Families

Mombian declared June 1st as Blogging for LGBT Families Day!

She says:

Why June 1st? This date falls exactly between Mother's Day and Father's Day. As such, it honors mothers and fathers equally, but also conveys that not all families fit into the traditional structure of one mother and one father. June 1st is also the start of Gay Pride Month.

I am retro-blogging because I missed the actual day (i.e. I am WRITING this on June 2nd but POSTING on June 1st. Cool, eh? Too bad we can only retro-blog, not pre-blog and see how the stock market is doing!).

In any case, the event was a resounding success!

Here is a list of bloggers who participated!

Lesbiandad has a great post in honor of the day.

Mombian also posted some information about Same-Sex Parents, including a study on the cost of marriage inequality to children and their same-sex parents by the Human Rights Campaign.

In honor of the day, I will re-post a story that I wrote titled "Girls Can't Marry Other Girls" which is forthcoming in the Journal of Feminist Family Therapy.

Like Clockwork

Last night, because we were worried about the night flipping, we checked on him nearly hourly.

Each time I ventured into their room, he was in a different position.

Face down, East-West.

Face up, North-South.

Half-up, Half down, East-West.

Face down, South-North.

His body was like hands on the clock, marking off the hours.

Po-TAY-To, Po-TA-To

As opposed to the potato, carrots were very well received.

The Definition of Insanity

Is when you do the same thing over and over, expecting a different result.

BioMom told me that old joke in the wee hours of the morning after Mr. Big had scared the hell out of me.

I heard a few grunts on the monitor and decided to go check on him in his crib.

When I walked in, he had turned himself so that he was lying, sideways, face down.

JHC.

So, he's consistently flipping over, from back to front, but he is, as yet, unable to flip those 23 pounds back.

I turned him back over and straightened him out, only to watch him flip back over like a fish out of water, grunting angrily at the crib's hard mattress in disgust as if to say GET OUT OF MY WAY, WENCH! YOU DISGUST ME!

He repeated this maneuver throughout the night, with me half-sleep worrying in the room next door.

Fortunately, whenever he would flip over, his head is strong enough to move to one side to assure an open airway.

I asked BioMom why he would continually do something that was guaranteed to end in frustration.

Because he can.

Manipulation

Lillies

The Yoga Master

More on the Name Game

We're watching our friend's four-year-old girl this weekend while they enjoy the Big Apple.

She is lovely and, despite never having had a sleepover before, she's doing just fantastic.

She regularly, however, has been calling her parents by their first names to us. BioMom told them about it on the phone last night and they said that they very much preferred that she did not do that, and they often discourage her from doing so.

I wondered if kids of GLBT parents refer to their parents by their first names while they are in the company of others in order to be clear as to whom they are referring.

What Do These Numbers Have In Common?

135

45

10


Answer: Minutes of crying before falling asleep on three consecutive nights.

Now, more interestingly, check out these numbers.

0, 150
0, 45

These represent his naps yesterday. The first number is the minutes crying, the second is the minutes asleep.

YAHOO!

What Me, Worry?

Did anyone see David Gregory's interview with President Bush on the Today show this morning?

It went something like this:

Gregory: How do you respond to the fact that your approval ratings are now below Nixon's during the Watergate scandal?

Bush: [chuckles to himself]

Gregory: Are you laughing?

Bush: No, I'm not laughing.

Gregory: So, how do you explain your approval ratings?

Bush: We're at war!

I'm so sick of the tautology of this administration. Does he think he is the first and only President to go to war? Does he think that the American public has no opinion about this war? Does he completely dismiss our opinions as if we are a bunch of children?

His insouciance has become intolerable.

The First Supper

The Swinger

Since it is finally thawed here, we've been spending a lot of time in the back yard on the swingset with the neighbors in the evenings. Mr. Big's got his little swing, the SYO and her compatriates have swinging contests and the rest of us kick around a soccer ball, getting eaten up (already) by the soon-to-be occupying force of mosquitos.

Last night the SYO was attempting a dismount when, at the last moment, after having taken her hands off of the swing's ropes, she changed her mind and stayed on the swing for another cycle.

It was one of those slow motion moments for me, sitting on the hammock across the yard with the baby.

I thought to myself: Oh, she decided not to jump. Then: Uh oh. This is not good. She's let go of the ropes!

On the back end of the swing's trajectory, she fell out, landing on all fours. We exchanged an agonizing look that felt like it lasted for 3 minutes.

Later, she comes up to me and says:

That swing is my boyfriend.

Oh? [as casually as possible. Where does she get this terminology?]

Yeah. And he DUMPED me!

?

End-Of-Semester Sighs and Anxieties

I submitted my grades electronically last night at midnight or so.

What's exciting now is to wait for the equivocating emails to roll in.

"What grade did I get on the final?"

"How could I have goten an ____ [put in whatever grade you like -- there's always someone who is dissatisfied]."

This is probably the hardest part of my job -- demarcating differences between ABs and Bs, for example, and then explaining that to the students. This semster I had to ruin one very bright woman's 4.0. Of course, it is not my fault per se. But it all seems so arbitrary in some sense. I could have asked different things on the final, for instance. Also, how much does one grade matter. At the margin though, it was this grade that dropped her average below perfection. Alas.

Along similar lines, the pediatrician yesterday gave us a lecture on letting Mr. Big cry himself to sleep in order to teach him how to pacify himself.

Its hard to be the bad guy.

Why I Should Have Become a Sociologist Rather Than an Economist. . .

It is NEVER the girls that get crushes on me. . .

I just got this email today:

Hey [Blogauthor] ( I hope its alright if I call you [Blogauthor]), or Dr. [Blogauthor's Last Name],
as you can see, this is (Insert smart but awkward student's name) from your 2:15, T,H, class. I was wondering what you are doing with your spare time this afternoon. If your not busy and would like to hang out, I just have a few questions that need clarification. Ive never asked a Professor to do this before, but I enjoy your company regardless. Im also not sure what professors do with their sparetime (busy?,not busy?) well I hope you get this within the next 4 hours and hit me back
thanx

Five Months Old

Or, what I do with my spare time (see above).

On Becoming A SAHM

So after three finals this week, attending graduation on Saturday and (lest I forget) grading those finals, I will embark, officially, on my next personal adventure (albeit one with a defined horizon): Stay At Home Momdom.

Aside: I'm still fairly uncomfortable with the "mom" label and was even regretting labelling this blog with that title. Maybe it should be Diary of a Lesbian Step-Father?

As in "Father Knows Best?"

Oh. . . . "Father" is even more problemmatic.

Dad?

As in "Whose your Daddy?" Okay that's just gross. Reserved for middled aged men in their fling-stage.

SAHM (pronounced "Sam")?

I've seen other lesbians each use a variante of "Mom", like "Mama" and "Mommy", but we're in the process of trying that and I just get confused.

"Mommy?"

No response.

"MOMMY"

No response.

"Oh, do you mean me?"

Or, "Let's go to the front door! Mama, I mean Mommy, I mean Mom is coming home!"

I've also seen other lesbian couples create really fun terms like "Baba."

I like this better on its face, but I can't help but giggle every time I try to get the SYO to call me something funny. I think its because I regularly introduce myself to her friends with really weird titles like "GooneyGooGoo" or something.

So far "Mamoo" is sticking. But again, I end up calling BioMom that as often as not.

Honestly, these are the first labels in my life with which I've had this much trouble.

We've got to come up with a new collective term for the Non-Biological Lesbian Partner-Parent. How about NBL-Double-P pronounced: "Enn-Be-ell-double P"? As in "NBL double P? CAN I HAVE SOME MORE ICE CREAM? . . . WHY NOT? WHEN?"

Somehow what they call me in this context seems of secondary importance.

Anyway, I am excited and terrified all at once. I am on FMLA in the fall and teaching part time at Macalester in the spring. A true break from working - if you call what I do "work" (I am a labor economist, so, because I receive such little disutility from the activities associated with my job, it's hard to really call it work -- certainly in the Marxian sense -- which, ironically nearly all Neoclassical economists have adopted(.

Of course, a break sounds lovely.

And I've got a reading list that's through the roof.

Oh, and those paper ideas to finish up.

And that book idea I've always had.

But what is wonderful and impossible about this particular break is that none of that is entirely possible.

Well, maybe if I were brilliantly efficient and could really accomplish something in the hour-ish chunks he gives us.

So its this strange place of just being. Taking care of the now five (!) month old, his sister and BioMom. Feeling itchy that I SHOULD be getting more done but unable to effectively jam in little chunks of time.

So yeah. I'm terrified.

But also thrilled.

Oh What People Will Say When They Don't Have to Identify Themselves

A colleague of mine brought in an interesting speaker a few weeks ago that set off a firestorm in the local rag.

Check out an article about the event and the discussion that ensued here. Note: the discussion moves from bottom up.

It is easy to forget that there are people out there that think this way.

B(u)y The Book

Today the SYO and I went to a local bookstore to hear Kate Dicamillo speak.

Grandma had given her The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane, which was a lovely little story. Grandma sent her postcards along the way (as we read the book) that depicted the rabbit's journey.

We took her copy in to have it signed and I encouraged the SYO to, if she felt comfortable, ask the author anything that she was curious about, regarding the book. To be honest, we hadn't done much research. Sure, we watched the movie Winn-Dixie and we had read the Edward Tulane book, but that was really it. And, I didn't really brief her about such an event. But she seemed interested, so we went.

We got there a little late and she maneuvered her way to the front only to come running back to me:

Someone else has a book just like mine!

Clearly, she had missed the point. There were HUNDREDS of copies of ALL of the author's books conveniently on hand for purchase.

Surprisingly, she got a question in in the general Q and A:

So, how'd you come up with the idea?

The author seemed nonplussed:

Let's cut to the chase then, why don't we?

Another book of interest was just published and contains an essay by The Other Mother. Check out Confessions of the Other Mother : Non-Biological Lesbian Mothers Tell All.

New Dog, New Tricks