The World is Missing an Obernburg

When I was a kid my granny had a house upstate NY just outside of this tiny little one-intersection town called Obernburg.  It cost nothing as it had been passed down from generation to generation in my pop-pops family, and it was in a town with a population so small the "school" was literally a loft in the church with maybe 4-5 farmer's kids and all mixed up grades.  I mean, this was Little House in the Prairie time.

   It was only a summer home for us that my uncle Robert would occasionally visit in the winter to hunt.  We'd open every Memorial Day weekend and close every Columbus Day in the fall.  But every summer vacation, every weekend in between almost, someone was always visiting and for whoever it was it became a fairly annual tradition. 

   I wouldn't say we were a very rich family, but I remember being at least comfortable for a while.  There weren't too many modern conveniences there (if you don't count the running water and electric oven).  You had to climb a long hill and follow a long dirt road to get there.  The things that stood out was that there was a giant Lilac bush right outside my granny's bedroom windows (always blooming opening weekend), a wood burning stove and separate fireplace that was the only source of heat for the two hemispheres in the house, several small bedrooms (it was almost littered with them), two pits on the hill, one for barbarque and one for garbage, and great big front porch lined with mismatched rocking chairs.

   It wasn't any one of these particulars that lent this place it's magic.  I've since been to many one-intersection towns, and barbaqued on several different barbaque pits.  I've even come to envy some of the more modern conveniences of other people's homes in the country.  None of that was what made this place special.

   There was no just "stopping by" as it was hours away from really ...anything.  And there was no TV, so when you were up you were engaging.  Each swarm of people who came had their own charm and each bring back such unique little memories I won't share here because I can't.  They are a part now of the very fabric of me.  

   Years later, as my granny retired she had to make a choice of whether to keep Obernburg, or sell it and continue her "real" life in the city.  In the end she thought she chose to be close to family.

   It's ironic though as for me it seems that was the end of family.  No more long weekends working together to complete the chores of opening the blankets, taking the rock off the chimneys, or mowing and weed whacking the tremendous lawns.  No more revolving doors of company.  No more late nights playing board games at the table, rocking with the old folks on the porch, or lying out under the stars up on the hill.  No more long uninterrupted chats.  No more swarms of people looking into each other's eyes or side by side watching whatever.  No more real sharing.  No more clear memories.  No more laughter.

   But whenever I catch a scent of Lilac, or cedar and moth balls, I'm back.  Clear summer skies, long afternoons, and stars so close and plentiful you could almost literally taste them.  The world needs a little Obernburg again.  I'm not sure what is wrong with all of us, but that I know now for sure.

lgbT

When your wife, your bestie and your old friend all question your judgment it may be time to stop?  It's just hard because is it crazy that I love him?  I think he's just about the most beautiful person I've ever seen.  And she's right,  I'm learning every day about how there is cause for concern when you're different.  I straddle the line between standing out and the fitting in every day and still struggle with it.  But when I look in his eyes all I see is beauty and love and light and perfection and it doesn't matter if he's wearing a dress but what I can't tell is whether or not the dress actually enhances the beauty.  And if it does, is it fair?  

   Transgenderism is the fringe of our community.  It always has been.  I remember my professor in college opening my mind to the reality that we think the "Trannies" are the most visible and therefore avoid association with them or embrace them only in humor.  It's our coping mechanism.  But in the end, our movement is actually a push to show the world that we're not like them.  We're just like you, Straight People.  That's why we come out in droves to you as your sons and daughters, sisters and brothers, peers and friends.  We aren't just lovers.  We live - everywhere.

   And the truth is, we always have been.  Just look the history of blending in by switching teams.  My eyes opened to this after reading Trumpet by Jackie Kay, and the movement now to understand Transgenderism and their long history of going to bathrooms!  

   But then just as Staceyann Chin says, sooner or later we see that all oppression is connected.  And it's time we turn around and look seriously at our transgendered brothers and sisters.  What are they doing?  We inevitably ask.  Don't they see?  Look what we've done for them!  Gender no longer matters.  Why are they insisting on it?  Girls need not wear dresses anymore.  Why are they wearing that dress!?!

   Complicate that even more: I thought that as an LGBT parent there would be nothing I couldn't handle.  Why is my son wearing a dress!  What's going to happen to him?!

   Much to the confusion of my family I always purported that it was my wife who eventually gave me my feminine side.  Two years after dating her I dropped to one knee on a beach in Florida, asked her to "marry" me, and gave her my entire inheritance: my late mother's diamond engagement ring.  We returned, proud and euphoric showing off her fingers to family who smiled politely at a stone they'd all seen before, but happy to be nice to me.  One year after that, they didn't know what to do when she shocked me by saving up for a rainbow studded diamond engagement ring to give me when she asked me to "marry" her.  All they knew was that their little tomboy/lesbian was now running around like a blushed bride showing off her new rock saying something about marriage - which was illegal at the time - and didn't they already perform their smily faced support dance with all the proper etiquette required a year ago?

   I was so happy.  I wore that shiny ring loud and proud and never felt like I fit into society more than I did then.  It was like a rite of passage.  People would remark, I got to say that I was "engaged."  I got to refer to her as "my fiancé" and bask in that unique ungendered uniformity.  I got to come out if I wanted to, but first, I got to experience fitting in.

   In our first child all I wanted was health.  Boy/Girl didn't matter.  I had beautiful names chosen for each and a cradle of love ready to grow.  But after we had our first boy, and I got pregnant with our second, I dreamed of a little girl.  I could raise her empowered with vision.  I already had "Future President" onesies I'd bought for my niece and I was armed with a full boy colored wardrobe ready for commandeering for gender battle with my old foe, the color pink.

   I cried when I was told Niky would be a boy.  Big heavy plopped tears even though I fought to stay adhered to my purported "Gender doesn't matter" face.  My wife told me it was awesome that Kody would have a little brother and she lovingly referred to them first as "The boys."  But I spent the better part of my life avoiding boys and by this point I feared the loss of my little mini me fantasy.  All that independence, all that privilege!  What would I have to offer a him?

   And here I am gazing into my mother's eyes real time just above my own nose and hair.  My heart twirls around my life on it's own two legs complete separate from me or my power and often in a green fairy dress.  He didn't specifically ask for a dress.  He just put one on at the first opportunity.  The first opportunity was at a friend's house of half girls/half guys, all lezbo moms.  There was no extra attention paid.  

   When it was "dress crazy" day at school he immediately ran to dig out the rainbow tutu he hadn't touched in six months.  He wore it to school too.  He even came home happy.

I showed him a couple dresses after watching this story about a trans girl's euphoria after getting a whole new wardrobe.  He liked the green shoulder strapped with the matching hairband of white daisies and green streamers.  I took a chance.  I bought it.  I thought I'd just have it available.

   And he didn't ask to wear it right away.  When it arrived he said it "used to be" his favorite color.  Then last night he just puts it on.  And this morning asks to wear it to school.

   We told him it's too cold and will later explain dresses are for special occasions?  He later asked to wear it to play rehearsal.  I was simply too tired.  I couldn't deal.  I told him no.  He changed without complaint.  

   Amy, my friends, everyone it seems to me is too quick to dismiss it as a phase or the whim of an all-too-proud lesbian mom?  I don't know.  I see him as such an individual I can't even assign gender.  He doesn't fit in those boxes to me yet.

   We took him to the department store to look for T Shirts.  Amy gathered five shirts, two from the girl's side and asked him to choose two we'd buy for him.  After much deliberation, he chose one of each.

   Are we doing it right?  It seems we can't help doing it wrong.  But we're trying.

Parent Teacher Night

Parent Teacher Night is becoming so special for me.  Don't get me wrong.  I love being part of a two parent household and I don't know what I'd do without my wife.  But she's an elementary school teacher, and I'm a middle school teacher.  In NYC's DOE that translates a rare responsibility solely mine (at least for the next 5 or so years.)

   It wasn't always so easy.  I remember coming home crying.  "He's hitting his peers" I was told about my oldest when he was in Kindergarden.  They wanted to send him away to some special school.
   "I don't understand why he's hitting anybody!" I exclaim in frustration to my South Bronxian coworkers the next day.  We never hit him a day in his whole life!"
   "Ah well there's your problem!"  I was told almost in unison.

   But Kody has always been different.  When he was 18 months our worse fears were confirmed as my wife and I heard the dreaded word "autism" through white hot pounding flashes and in slow agonizing motion.  As special educators we knew the initals "PDDNOS" and the prognosis: different.  At least, we thought we did.  But there was one thing we didn't know.  Kody.

   This child is my Superman.  There is no challenge he cannot leap over in a single bound.  I have had a front row seat to a human being saddled with the most pervasive, debilitating, overwhelming challenges at the most vulnerable time of his life, and been floored with his focus, and stamina, endurance, and sheer power of love and will!  One week it's his speech.  Next week?  It's licked.  Another week it's joint attention.  Next week "Look!" This goes on and on until I internally know they just needed to stick it out.  He'll stop hitting, I knew.  Just as soon as we make it clear to him it's a priority, he'll conquer this too.

   And he did.

   And now our youngest is in Kindergarden.  He beams as he finally gets to strut through his older brother's halls.  Long hair flowing behind him, Niky's teacher blushes as she describes escorts to the bus with Niky as a paparazzi leveled event!  His report card is all 3s and 4s, he's ahead in art, drama, gym, every teacher looks shocked when they describe his levels, and the words "smart" "genius" and "rockstar" become synonymous with his first name.

   I'm proud, don't get me wrong.  Niky is another force that was meant to be.  It took us 4 years to make Kody.  It took us one month to make Niky.  Thank God I'm a lesbian, because Niky's donor was the first sperm to enter this body in 20 years.  I was terrified of having a baby my whole life, had one moment of desire to make Kody a sibling, and vowed that would be the last try for a while moments after insemination.  But I didn't need to worry about another try.  That was it!  Niky had his wondow and he bounded through.

   And it's been that way ever since.  With Kody we dreamed of a good report card, and he worked and worked on every single obstacle of the thousands that stood in between.  One at a time.  Each in succession.  One foot in front of the other.

   Then Niky hands one to us, and just as he does Kody wins the "Get-Your-Seatbelt-On-First Challenge for the last chocolate Munchkin.  And despite Niky's tears I don't even need to look as Kody breaks it in half and offers Niky his choice.  Niky chooses the bigger half.  And I beam.  I could not love either of these kids more.  I wish everybody had my perspective.

Really Great Parenting (Not)

Usually we are positively enthusiastic and attentive parents.  But after an entire summer, and now the Jewish holidays, even the best parents get tired.  This morning was the first time in a while we lay in bed with the pillows over our heads.  I looked at Amy and got up fixing them food before heading out to the store.
   "I'm out.  Don't worry.  TVs on but low so they're bound to be distracted from this ridiculously loud pretend play soon."
   She thanks me profusely.  I do my errands and return.
   Rummaging through the kid's backpacks to get ready for the coming week, I found they there was a little bit of homework that never got finished.  Calling them from the TV and the pretend play that spanned the length of the apartment proved to be lengthy, especially since I'm tired and scarcely care.  Amy, up now and energized, comes in laughing about how their hiding in their room as to not do homework.
   Maybe we should not be letting them get away with this, I suggest.
   "Are you kidding?  This is the quietest they've been all morning!  We should have broke out the homework on Friday!"

Lessons from a Teacher

Maybe I'm getting old but it's dawning on me that there are experts out there at my age who are contributing to the welfare of humanity, and all I do for my degrees, my debt, rented home and shaky finances, is teach in the South Bronx.  However, I've picked up a few truths in my years I know would fix us all if everyone truly understood them, so I'll share.

Being a teacher I've learned and internalized:

We are all born with the odds stacked against us.  Appreciate this.

All attempts to veil reality from children fail.

When someone does something for attention, the best thing you can do is give it to them.

We all need different things to learn.  Children won't take more than they need.

You can try to teach anything you want but the only thing that will ever be learned, is truth.

Everyone wants to please if they know how.

Learning happens within a zone that is naturally wide but narrow on demand.  Control of those parameters is an art, a science, a team effort, a dance, and a calling.

That zone requires summers off.

No answer neglects a question.

You only get angry at others for what you're guilty of yourself.

Love really is the answer.

Being gay didn't make me as good as straight parents.

Twists and turns either knock you down, or build character.  

   I have an uncle who told me once that he "didn't mind" my being gay as long as I never birthed my own children.  He wasn't particularly religious but expressed a kind of scientific dogma that was new at least to my experience.  He knew and accepted that 10% of most given populations (human or animal) are gay.  What he derived from this however, was that to him "gayness" could be explained as a natural form of population control.  He felt that 90% of any given population must "naturally" be charged with the burdens of sustaining that population, mainly reproduction, while this elite 10% can focus their energies on what the rest are too tired to accomplish.  In his mind, my sexuality was "ok" by him provided I either abstained from having a family, or did so only through some means of adoption.  This way I was either adhering to "Nature's wishes" by focusing on some kind of furthering of my species (professionally I guess), or caring for "another's" child to relieve them from the burden of having to do so.

   If it makes anybody feel any better about the vehicles and personality of "Nature," it might amuse you as much as it did me to know his daughter came out as gender fluid to me just a few years after his assertions.

   Regardless of all this unsolicited speculation, it's true that study after study exlpores the success of same sex parented families.  We are often put under a microscope and held accountable in every possible way.

   I find it absurd now in hindsight that anybody ever uttered the words "gay parents can be just as good as straight parents."  I find it absurd because I now know that being gay didn't make me "as good as" straight parents.  Being gay made me an exceptional parent.  Not only that, but being gay made my wife an exceptional parent.  It made my friends exceptional parents, even when they divorce!  And ultimately, it made our children, our schools, our communities, our whole planet and future - so much more exceptional.

   I remember the peculiar hurt and anger I felt at this uncle.  My mother died young and I have no biological siblings.  The thought of someone telling me I couldn't - or shouldn't - ever make a child based on some obligation to ...nothingness was just too difficult to internalize.

   But such is the nature of our political existence these days.  Even as study after study shows that kids of same sex couples grow up loved and supported by two people who at this point in our evolution fought hard internally and often externally to be together, only to then often even have to fight harder to have a family.  They show these kids start off awesome, well provided for, and looked after generally by grateful, enthusiastic, attentive parents who definitively planned to have them and raise them.  By mid-elementary school studies show they sometimes begin to report being teased in some way by their peers due to their same sex family and many at this point face that choice between authenticity or a kind of clandestine existence.  No matter what they choose by high school they are more aware, more confident and more adventurous, and yes, they are often more sexually adventurous, meaning these kids don't stay in any closet long.  They are who they are often faster than even any of us pioneers.  Overall all of them wind up just as often straight as gay - meaning "gay" parents don't have "gay" kids any more than straight parents do.  But our kids know what it is to be different, and they deal with it sooner rather than later.  But they also do so knowing they are wanted and loved unconditionally by their community the whole time.  Love is what defines this culture and community.  There is no other cutlure like ours.

   That's the difference here.  I started off life wanting to be a preacher and wound up rounding life's twists and turns until I find myself with a same sex family.  That road has afforded me with a lot of sympathies and perspective shifts I can now handle with ease.  I'm well practiced now at being loyal and religious, scientific and dogmatic, happy and sad, and different and ok with that.

   When it turned out one of my children was on the autism spectrum, I understood that I'd been thrust back in to another more complicated kind of closet.  Here I was with a kid who could easily "pass," but also with a unique understanding of the rewards that come from valuing honesty and support and how much they outweigh the burdens.  I also knew the pitfalls and impositions of a stranger's fear and the insecurities that make one vulnerable to them.  And throughout all of it I also now have to navigate this process while shouldering a responsibility to a future adult of whom I was actually busy helping to shape.

   It makes your head spin!  And as another of my children is deciding between his/her gender identity, I'm providing the safety and support with which to explore this territory.  My kids will have every opportunity available to support their happiness first, and couldn't have been born into a better family situation to do so.

   Because in a nutshell, I rock.  My wife rocks.  My kids? - totally rock!  Who was the first first grade comedic hit at the school talent show?  My Kody!  Who learned to read at 3, play Chess at four, and practices 2nd grade math (in Kindergarden) almost every night after working on learning a second language?  My Niky!  Who lives by the mottos "Do no harm" and "Always make new mistakes?"  MY kids!  And who is prouder than proud to have created, sustained, encouraged, and believed in this family?  ME!  Being gay made me a exceptional parent!  There's nothing equal about us. 

My Son's Coming Out

My son just came out of his closet the other day.  It's funny how we joke about this; my friends and I all being mostly 2, 3, 4 mom- headed families.  We all had our different coming out stories.  But now, being in the parental roles, it's just as strange to navigate.

   We were on a playground when a friend of mine mentioned how galant my Kody was to her daughter back on the slide,  taking her daughters hand and helping her and her friend off gently.  Later, alone with my boy, I expressed how proud I was and how his gentlemanly reputation had reached me.  He asked what I meant, and when I explained, he got very serious.  "Mom, I have to tell you something."

   I recognized the severe tone, but not from experience with him.  "What's up Bud?"

   "I like girls."

   I laughed.

   "No Ma, really.  I'm serious.  I know I want to marry a girl."  

   We're always so quick to include "wife or husband" or "husband or wife" whenever referring to anyone's future marriage plans.  I told him not to worry about who he wants to marry right now, and to just be nice to everyone.  "Just because you like and want to marry a girl doesn't mean you only be nice to girls.  I want you to help boys too if they need it."

   He scrunched up his nose.  "Help boys?"

   I felt my defenses go up.  "Yes help boys.  What's wrong with helping boys?  I want you to be nice to everyone no matter who they are or who they love."

   Five minutes after telling all the girls my son's coming out story, I hear a familiar "Mooom!!!" coming from the slide.  My son's head pops up from behind another couple boys.  "Mom!  I helped a boy!"
   I love this kid.