November, 2008

“When I’m really, really old, like a hundred years old, am I going to die?”

What was I supposed to say?

I try so hard to be honest; it’s easy for me to be truthful about body parts and how babies are made and when animals die, and to explain with words and concepts that a four-year-old can comprehend.

But when he asks about death?  Mine.  Or now, his.  I hit the boundary of what I can truthfully say to him because I don’t seem to be able to comprehend my child ever, ever dying.

My dear mother once said:  “When you have little children, stay home for Christmas.  Let everyone come to you.”  This didn’t mean much to me until I had a baby–and discovered that he didn’t like long car trips.  Now I think I have another one.  And just in time for my parents to have moved from two hours away to 15 hours away (but to a location with a very warm beach).

So the question is:  Do I brave that very long car trip with a 4, 3, and 4 month old?  (After spending 18 hours of Christmas 2004 in an airport, flying is out of the question–forever.)  We can swing by my parents, then on to my husband’s, and see several sets of wonderful family members.  We would doubtlessly have a lovely time–once we reached out destinations.

But what if this happens?  . . . for all fifteen hours?

Will I again be contorting myself into hitherto unimaginable positions to nurse a baby while careening down the highway at 75 miles per hour . . . all the time staying fastened in my seat belt?  I’ve done it before, but it wasn’t pleasant . . . and it wasn’t pretty.

Chris loves cars.  He tells me so several times a day.

Going to pick up Martin from school:  “Mom, I love cars.”

Eating a banana on the couch:  “I love cars.”

Building a block tower:  “Mom?  Mom?”

“Yes, Chris?”

“I love cars.”

Oh, what a little boy he is, right?  In my never-ending quest to figure out how gender roles are manifesting themselves in their lives, I try to pay attention to their games and how they play.  They like animals and blocks and scooters and dolls and paints.  I’m not seeing glaring differences right now among the little boys and little girls they play with that can’t be attributed to personalities.

And even the car fascination is not quite so simple as it seems.  The stereotype is that little boys love cars.  But what do we do with that stereotype when the little boy makes families out of all his cars, and imagines the mother car rescuing the brother car when he’s stuck in the mud?  Or the father race car carrying the brother race car when he has a flat tire?  Or the brother cars helping each other find the gas station?

I’m very good at Friendly Neighbor Small Talk.  Give me a topic to discuss with my kind and lovely new neighbors and I’m off, be it weather, sports, kids, gardening (even if I don’t really do it), cooking (even though I never do it) . . .  That’s not to say that I’m saying anything remotely interesting or pertinent, but it’s very good small talk–I even manage to eliminate/reduce the swearing.

But I’ve discovered a topic that stops me in my garrulous tracks.  Religion.  Hearing about someone else’s?  Wonderful.  Discussing it with a friend?  Fascinating.  Feeling pressured to join in by someone I barely know?  Watch me stammer and sweat.

“Hey, Marjorie, our kids are doing something this fall that your kids would love,” a woman from down the street said to me the other day.  She started talking, and suddenly I hear something about Evangelical Christian Church.  I gasped.  (Inwardly.)  (I think.)  My small talk skills on religion being quite poor, I bit my tongue to keep quiet, since all I could think to say was, “No, thanks, we don’t do god and church and stuff . . .”  But I was quite sure, from a distinct vibe I was getting as she ramped up and then, somehow, brought book-banning into the conversation (she’s all for it), that that would result in some markedly un-small talk, and perhaps even a conversion attempt.

I’m not sure if she assumed I was Christian (and evangelical at that) which is astounding to me, or if she was attempting a recruitment, which is insulting, or if she was just being friendly, but this was no come-to-my-church-for-cookies-and-tea conversation–this was a come-be-very-evangelical-with-us invitation.  I just wanted to get the mail and go back inside.

I made a conscious decision to try to figure out what to say that didn’t involve the words atheist or you’re scaring me.  Since I rarely think about what I say before I say it, this was difficult, but I finally squeaked, “Oh, thanks for thinking of us–it sounds like your kids really love it there!  I’ve got to run and feed the baby!”  And I ran.

I watched you care for your sons at our children’s school fair; a mother helping the older son get a sno-cone and tie his shoes and a mother cradling a newborn, and wondered what it would feel like to have my family under assault the way yours is.

I tried to put myself in your place, and to imagine that groups of people were getting together in the streets and on the internet and on television to pool their might and money to attack my family and relationship. I would hope that I could find the eloquence and energy to mobilize and inspire like Lesbian Dad and Vikki at Up Popped the Fox in the face of such bigotry.  I’m not sure I could.

But it isn’t solely up to gay Americans to defend themselves.  How dare these proponents of Proposition 8 in California try to strip any American of her rights or tell her what her family ought to look like?  This assault on gay relationships and families is an attack on every American’s rights, gay and not gay, and we can’t let it happen.

No on 8

Title:  love & hate, by *_Abhi_*