Does This Baby Make Me Look Straight?: Confessions of a Gay Dad (14 page)

A few months later, we were going east again. This time for Passover. With that free-night coupon burning a hole in my mailbox, I booked room 207. I thought the kids would
be more comfortable if they recognized the room. Jonah was just barely a half-year older and a half-year more mature. He said repeatedly that he would not touch the fire alarm. I couldn’t help wondering what kind of havoc he
would
be willing to wreak.

The first night, we put the kids to bed in the bedroom and Don and I decided to sleep on the pullout couch of the adjoining living room. We were on West Coast time, so the kids were wide awake until about midnight. Suddenly, just as I was finishing up the last bedtime story, I noticed Eliza was scratching her head. A lot. I switched on the light for a closer look. Yep. Crawling in and out of strands of her platinum blond locks, a sly, disgusting, cocky little louse. Immediately, instinctively, I started scratching my own head. That’s when she started screaming: “Lice! Lice!” We’d just recently gone through this at home and she’d picked up from us that lice were the devil. I shushed her as though it would make it less true. I pulled both kids out of the bed and started stripping the sheets. I calmed her down a bit as I frantically looked through Jonah’s hair to see if the little bug had siblings. Thankfully, Jonah’s scalp was clean. Oh, no, there was one. Damn it. Don threw on his coat and shoes.

“Where are you going?” I asked, desperate not to be left alone with the little critters who were now infested with little critters. It was all too much.

“I’m going to find an all-night pharmacy.”

“What for? All they’ll have is Rid,” I warned him.

“So? I’ll get that!” He was already halfway out the door.

“It’s pure poison,” I told him.

“Great. Then it won’t take long to kill them.”

“You mean kill the kids.” I knew I was being a bitch. But what did I really want? One of us had to go and get something to put in their hair. And I didn’t want to drive out into the night almost as much as I didn’t want to stay alone in that hideously cursed room 207.

“No!” Don protested. “I’m not even going to get into this with you right now. I’m sorry they don’t have lavender oil or coconut juice or the yolk of a dove’s egg or whatever the fuck you think will kill them naturally. But it’s one in the morning and we’re desperate!” And he was gone.

Eliza started screaming again. She felt something crawling down her back. She was convinced that eggs were hatching in her scalp and millions of bugs trying to bite her. This, of course, only made Jonah scream. So that was fun. At around 1:30 a.m., someone knocked at my door and asked that we “keep it down.” I glared at the guy. I mean, honestly. It wasn’t like we were having a kegger and blaring a dance mix all night. Believe me. If I could have “kept it down,” I would have. I wanted to tell
him
to “keep it down,” but well, that would have been ridiculous and hysterical and irrational, all things I was feeling. The poor guy wasn’t wrong. My kids had, in fact, woken him up and I felt terrible.

I threw both kids into the bathtub. Amazingly effective at calming them down, I must say. Don got home with the battery acid for the kids’ hair at 2:30 and by 3:00 both kids were asleep. I know lice have become a problem for families across the country—across all regional, ethnic, religious, and socioeconomic landscapes. But there’s just something about it that makes you feel marred. You have cooties. And nothing
short of boiling your bedsheets, toys, clothes, and okay, even the kids themselves will truly rid you of them. You’re tainted. Forever. At least that’s how it feels.

On our third and final stay in room 207, one of the kids wet the bed in the middle of the night—which hadn’t happened in over a year and felt completely arbitrary. We chalked it up to the travel stress. Oh, and the bedtime milk boxes for which the kids had campaigned by jumping on the beds singing “Just this once” over and over again. Sorry, ever since my sister’s cheerleading days, I’m a sucker for any kind of synchronized chanting.

We called the front desk to get a new set of sheets. The housekeeper arrived, a middle-aged woman who had clearly never been introduced to Spanx and didn’t seem to care. She was the very definition of jolly. She entered the room and insisted on changing the beds for us. Delighted by the kids, she asked them tons of questions and told them all about her own. She looked at their bed and then over to us and our pullout couch. She tried to take in the whole scenario as she headed out of the room. Then she turned back.

“Is that the little boy who set off the fire alarm last year?” she asked. I was completely shocked the story had made Suites lore. Had nothing else really happened at this place in a whole year to erase that silly incident from people’s minds? I guess stories of lost room keys and jammed soda machines couldn’t compete.

“Yep. That was our Jonah. I suppose everyone heard about it.” This makes her laugh. More than she should.

“Oh yeah,” she says. Then she looks around again and finally asks boldly, “Um, where is their mother?”

It’s not like I haven’t gotten that question before. It happens, from time to time. Usually in places outside the bigger cities, which serves to remind those of us lucky enough to get cocky about how “normal” we feel in our lives as same-sex parents that it’s not like that everywhere. It’s good to be reminded that, oh yeah, this is weird for some people. So I usually have understanding and patience when I answer the questions from those who just don’t have firsthand experience with us gays. But something about her assumption sets me off.

I have been known to respond like a total asshole. I’ll either pretend not to speak English or I’ll start looking around, as though I only just realized that their “mother” is missing. But usually, I take a breath, ignore the insensitivity, chalk it up to ignorance, and explain our family. On this day, I found the question particularly offensive because of the context. She was making a correlation between the fire alarm incident with Jonah and the absence of a traditional mother in our family.

Where is your chin?
I wanted to ask her.
There are just so many of them, it’s hard to suss out just the one
. I wanted to hurt her. No. I wanted her to know she had hurt me with her question.

“Well, I don’t know where you’re from, but this is America. And even if we don’t have the same rights you do to marry the person you’ve committed your life to, we do have the right to start a family. So maybe you’re too closed-minded or coldhearted or just plain ignorant to be able to imagine that two men could be parents. But guess what? We were fortunate enough to be part of an adoption plan with a wonderfully generous young woman in Wisconsin, not just
once, but twice . . . blessing us with the opportunity to give our kids a loving home and a well-rounded education, which is clearly something you missed!”

She was stunned. “Um . . . no,” she said. “I just remember you all from last time. There was a woman here. Short, curly hair?”

“Oh. That was my sister,” I said, turning red and hoping that this, in fact, would be the moment of my death.

As she headed out the door, she turned back quietly. “I apologize. I guess I was mistaking her for the kids’ mother.” Weirdly, she didn’t stay for the rest of the Q&A.

That would be the last time we would stay at that particular hotel. Clearly not for any fault of the place or its staff. There was just something about room 207 that brought out the worst in us. I also avoid that room number at every other hotel where I stay now. Just to be safe.

I
took the kids to a Winter Wonderland holiday party last year that very well may have spoiled any other party the kids would ever attend in the future. It was almost hostile in its fantasticness. It surpassed my wildest imagination of what a kids’ party could deliver. These people went all out. They re-created the North Pole with real snow, reindeer and sleigh rides, a snowman bouncy, crafts, a candy cane bar, photos with Santa, you name it.

At one point the kids were delighting over two out-of-work actors dressed as Mary Poppins and Bert, performing magic and songs. They, meaning I, loved it. Especially the part where they turned a white hankie into a bowl of Tootsie Pops. A spoonful of sugar really does help—well, you know, help you forget they’re not
really
who they’re dressed to be. That was until one of the bright-smiled performers, Mary, who like everyone else in L.A. would do anything to “make it,” possibly even porn, walked around passing out postcards for her industry showcase called “Desperately Seeking—Representation.”

I too performed for dozens of children’s birthday parties when I was in high school, delighting kids with balloon animals and kiddie illusions as The Great Houdanni. So I felt a
bit overprotective of my performing comrades. I clapped and whistled a little louder, perhaps, than I should have.

“Did you see that?” I shouted at Eliza and Jonah. “That hat was empty a second ago! Right? Where’d those Tootsie Pops come from?” I was genuinely impressed. “These guys are amazing, aren’t they?”

Suddenly, one of the moms turned to me, annoyed. “Tootsie Pops? Really? Why am I the only one who cares what goes into my child’s body?” She went on and on about how every single lick on a lollipop delivers corn syrup and refined sugar and artificial colors into the bloodstreams of our children, creating a chain reaction that compromises their health. Every single time!

Okay, Stressy Tessy, calm down!
I thought to myself. I mean, who wants to be the parent who begrudges their kid a sucker at a birthday party? Especially one given to them by Mary Fucking Poppins? So what if, after the party, she turns into adult film star
Cherry
Poppins? I didn’t want to be that dad.

I now look at my watch and realize we are into hour two. The kids are being shuttled from the Mary Poppins station to the Cotton Candy pavilion. They’re all squealing with delight as they line up to receive pink sticky clouds of refined sugar and artificial color.

I should pull Eliza and Jonah from the line
, I think.
It’s too much sugar. I’m compromising their health and they’ve already had lollipops, snow cones, and who knows what else. Can’t these people throw a party with carrot sticks and organic cheese squares?
Stressy Tessy had obviously gotten into my head.

I intercept the cotton candy lady. “Eliza and Jonah are
going to share one!” The kids start whining. Other parents groan.

“Oh, come on,” a burly dad says to me, “it’s a birthday party! What’s wrong with you?”

“Just pacing ourselves,” I explain. “I know cupcakes are in their futures. Just teaching them a little something called moderation and
compromise
.”

The parents snicker. I overhear a cacophony of responses: “Poor kids . . . It’s a birthday party! They’ve got
him
as a parent—isn’t that compromise enough?” Ouch. Where’s Stressy Tessy to back me up here?

I know the key is knowing
when
to compromise. How bad is a cupcake once in a while? Have you ever
had
a red velvet cupcake with cream cheese frosting? My God. It has to be a hell of a lot better than, say, the emotional damage from depriving yourself of one. It’s a worthwhile compromise.

The following week Don took Jonah to a superhero party and I was supposed to take Eliza to an all-girls “glamour party” for one of her classmates. I didn’t really know what a “glamour party” was, but it sounded right up my alley.

The party was held at a high-end beauty salon that had been taken over for the birthday. At first, I have to admit, I was dazzled by the unlimited access to this buffet of fabulousness: the brushes, combs, curling irons, makeup palettes, rows and rows of nail polish! And stylists and manicurists on hand to give makeovers. I heard a familiar voice behind me say, “Welcome! Enjoy a vegan snack!” I turn to face the voice and it’s Stressy Tessy! “Oh, hi!” she says, lighting up when she sees me. “Hello again!” I say, then explaining my surprise that she’s the birthday girl’s mother: “I didn’t put two and two together.”

“Yep! That was crazy last week, huh? But my snacks? All organic and gluten-free. And the juice boxes are coconut water. So you’ve got nothing to worry about! Your kids are safe. At least for the next two hours.” She laughs a lot at her own joke. “Help yourself to a glass of champagne while the girls get ready for the red carpet!” It’s only eleven a.m. but I can tell she’s not on her first glass. I thank her as Eliza runs to an empty chair to begin her beauty treatment. Then my auditory processing kicks in. “Red carpet”? I am not proud of the thirty minutes that followed, as it way too slowly dawned on me that my daughter was getting hair and makeup in order to be photographed by a team called “Party-razzi.” While Eliza enjoyed the hair, nail polish, and makeup treatment, she looked like a deer in headlights on the red carpet in a sequined dress with a feather boa, hearing her name being shouted out: “Eliza! Eliza! Right here!” She looked only at me the entire time, as if to say,
Daddy? What the fuck am I doing here? You
are
still my daddy, aren’t you? DO SOMETHING!

Stressy Tessy was standing behind the line of “pho
kid
raphers” shouting for all the girls to line up with hands on their hips. “Okay now, ladies, give us your sexy look! Right here! Sexy sexy sexy! Right here!”

That was it. I’d heard enough. I reached onto the carpet, grabbed Eliza by the hand, and made a beeline toward the exit, scurrying past trays of spelt cookies, carrot sticks, and fruit-juice-sweetened zucchini muffins. We only stopped once to grab our party favor—a bedazzled faux-leather handbag ostensibly to hold their faux car keys, faux BlackBerry, and faux Virginia Slims.

“Where are we going, Daddy?” Eliza asked me. “We left before the cake.”

“I know, babe, but you know what? It was time to go. And I’m not sure you were having so much fun with all those photographers taking your picture. Right?”