The Lifewriter's Digest Article -- Anthology

Love Wins

by Susan Lebel Young

Our second baby was a boy. We bought Zac honkin' black toy Tonkas. But then he stole his sister's Barbie. He liked changing her shoes and "Decowating Baaabie," he called it.

Because it's our parental responsibility to teach what we believe is the best way of life, we talked to Zac about not taking other people's things. And he asked, "Well, then, can I have my own doll?"

He was two years old.

Since family is a priority for us, when Zac turned three, we had a birthday party for him, with his cousins and grandparents all in attendance. Someone gave him a cowboy outfit. But he ran to our costume box and dressed up in one of my old floral skirts. "Mommy, tie this wibbon in my hair."

It was pink.

After a few days of kindergarten, Zac came home from school and asked, "Mom, can boys marry boys?"

"Well," I thought, "it's God's way to accept everyone just as they are." So I inquired, "Why do you ask?"

"I was just thinking, if you love Dad and you love me and you love Alisa, and we all love each other, and that's all good, why can't boys marry boys? There'd be more love in the world."

He was five.

When he was six, because we have strong community values, we signed Zac up for T-ball. He hated it. He put on his new leather baseball glove, which his dad bought, oiled and shaped for him the night before try-outs. His dad has sound family values, so he took time off from work to go to his son's games. Zac meant to catch the ball, I'm sure, but his hand was at least five inches away from the ball's trajectory. He cried. "Mom, I can't do this. But I've been practicing ballet in front of my mirror after you put me to bed at night. Can I have dance lessons?"

In middle school, where sports were mandatory, the jocks who went to church regularly, and who professed to be his friends, smashed him against the lockers and screamed, "Homo. Fag." These class leaders wrote graffiti on the walls, "Zac's queer."What saved him was landing the lead, Curly, in the eighth grade musical, Oklahoma. In the hushed auditorium, he waltzed through the dark from the back of the room floating toward the stage, singing, "Oh, what a beautiful morning."

The whole school fell silent. Finally they saw that, while they had been perfecting their jump shots, Zac had been training to hit high A. It was a crowing moment in Zac's life, to know that his God-given gifts and talents had been witnessed and acknowledged even by those who had been practicing hatred.

I called a psychiatrist, a deeply religious man, to ask him how I might understand. "Is there a way to predict who might be gay?"

He said, "All I know that research shows reliably is this: When a boy--from birth--consistently makes non-traditional choices, the chances are greater that he's gay."

"And is it painful, this coming out to himself? To others?" I asked this expert. Then--since it's a mother's job to care for her children with the wide-open Christian heart I was raised to cultivate, I added, "What do I do? How do I help?"

This doctor was a spiritual man. "Embrace him," he advised. "Listen to him. We all have pain. We all suffer. The training is love. Be a mom. You're doin' it."

When Zac was fourteen, he said he wanted a sewing machine for Christmas. "Sewing machine?"

"Think gay," he said.

"How long have you known?"

"Forever."

"So, Zac, what do you think about this argument that homosexuality is a choice?"

"Mom, who would choose this?'

I have a gay son. As a man, he has a distinct masculine identity. Husky, deep voice, ripped abs. He loves fast sports cars, so he can accelerate turning on curves. He pumps his own gas. He wears a Red Sox baseball cap. He drinks Starbucks. He argues vociferously. He can be bull-headed, with the bite of a scorpion. He works and plays and sleeps and eats. He calls on the phone and I end each conversation with, "Love you."

He says, "Love you, too."

If he ever loves a partner enough to marry him, I will take his decision as one more individual commitment which enhances and strengthens the collective institution of marriage. More love in the world.

Some argue that being gay is preventable. It is. We could all stop having children. A zero birth rate would wipe out homosexuality. But why would we want to eradicate the humor, the creativity, the flair, the oh-what-a-beautifulĐmornings they bring to the world? Why?

And to answer Zac's kindergarten question, "Can boys marry boys?" Why not? More love in the world.

Susan Lebel Young lives in Yarmouth, Maine. Sue is a writer and a long-time subscriber to The Lifewriter's Digest.