My Purple

Yes, it's true: I want my little boy to dress like a little boy, and I have some fairly strong opinions about what that means.

Hypocrisy, I know. Now that we're in lovely, liberal Portland, I find myself steering the Subaru closer and closer to Butchland, that happy place where androgynous looking women wear nothing but men's cargo pants and white tank tops. In fact, I'm not really resisting the urge to go around on weekends wearing. . . nothing but men's cargo pants and white tank tops. Yet I want my little man to look like a little man. And should Number 2 be a girl, I'll want her to look like the little princess we all know she'll be (if only just to spite us).

I guess it's my protective nature: These kids are going to have enough weird sexual orientation-related shit to deal with in middle school, assuming we're no longer in a place where having two mommies seems like the normal thing. My rational, reasonable brain knows that teenagers, particularly teenaged girls, pick on each other for an assortment of reasons -- if The Boy and Number 2 don't get teased for their lesbo moms, they'll get it for something else. Yet my snake brain says that for their own emotional well-being, our little poopers need gender-specific names and clothes. I'm not saying my little girl will have a pink ribbon in her hair from birth, but I'm not ruling it out.

That's nutty, right? And I'm willing to go along with whatever The Boy wants; each time we're in the mall or someplace similarly consumer-friendly, I stop in at children's clothes and ask them if they have anything purple for my son.

They look at me like I'm deranged, of course.

It's really not fair: The boys clothes are all functional and comfy looking, in primary colors that go well with anything. The girls clothes, even the toddler-ware, have spangles and frills and rhinestones and plunging necklines and tight legs and generally seem age-inappropriate and downright debilitating if you're in the mood for serious playground action. What's that all about? Are we, as a society, that freaked out about establishing our gender roles as early as possible? It's a little troubling. It makes me WANT to have a girl, just so I can raise one who is strong enough to swim against the tide.

Of course, the gods will send us one who wants pink and watches My Pretty Pony and likes to play dress up and wear high heels. She'll probably expect us to teach her how to use make up.

Maybe a second child isn't such a great idea.