“It’s okay to hav a Baba,” (sic) from the girlchild, Kindergarten year (2010).
The sun still hasn’t set on Baba’s Day this year, and I can’t pause long, but do want to leave a little something here for the occasion, in solidarity with any other comrade who happens by. The only way it’ll happen is with bullet points and incomplete sentences, so! Herewith:
- Talked at length to my Pops this morning about fatherhood, lesbian and otherwise. His loving support and openness to my whole self has a value beyond words. It is anointing, validating, liberating, inspirational. He essentially gets it, which is about as much as you want from anyone, especially a family member, particularly a parent.
- There’s much to say about our conversation, but not on the fly on the day itself. In short, we concur: when you disengage the clutch and allow your gears to coast unhindered by the space stamped out for them (allotted movement, only here and only in this way), all sorts of stuff that might otherwise bamboozle begins to make sense: masculine femininity, feminine masculinity, the fact that each of us who fights for more space for ourselves, who elbows more elbow room for a fuller, truer self, makes more space for others.
- We have more allies in this process than we know. Specifically, women trying to make space for parenthoods like mine have allies in gay men fathers and straight men fathers who themselves want company as they, too, expand the notions of what’s possible. I think my father appreciates my parental/gender journey because he’s just such a man. Either one (gay man father or straight). He’s 90 already, so if I don’t know now, I’ll probably never know which. His favorite answer to questions he can’t quite hear: “Probably.”
- Before I return to my day, here are some ditties from years past of topical interest:
Things I have in common with dads, from 2006,
A Baba’s Day Proclamation, from 2007, and
A Baba’s Day pictorial, from 2009
Happy day, to one and all.
Hope Baba had the best day so far and as the kids get older the day will hold even neater memories. Blessings on your family, LD, as you stretch the minds of others who haven’t even considered a place in our world for a Baba. I love you.
Happy Baba’s Day to you, LD! And Happy Father’s Day to your Pops. I love the joy he gets from watching you carve out and inhabit your own authentic role as parent to your amazing kids.
Happiest of Baba Days. It is, indeed, okay to have a Baba, especially one who bazookas what tends to bamboozle.
Happy Baba’s day! I appreciate your elbows.
Love this. It’s nice you have a name for what you are. After 7 years I’m getting “baba” at a deeper level- gives a word that encompasses your gender and your parentness at once. I might have to start using that too. I used to think having two moms would be easier for the kids, and that “Mom” was a word that should be big enough to include my masculine self, just as I’ve been elbowing out room in the word “woman” all these years. And it should be, but the thing I want is for my kids to feel strong and sure, and maybe a few new vocabulary words will help that project along. Thanks for making me think again about things I’d thought I’d thought through.