My Revised Gender Radicalism

By Anna Purrington Adams

The other day I was struck by the colors of the various pieces of clothing I was taking out of the dryer. In it were things such as a pair of bright pink sweatpants and a white fairy footed sleeper that belong to my infant daughter together with a bright green anklosaurus t-shirt and black slayer hoodie of my son’s. What I found most interesting about this was how obvious it would be to anyone, through only the colors of my laundry, to confirm the gender of my children. Dinosaur shirts = boy. Pink princess stuff = girl. But I never planned on it being that way for my kids, at least before they were actually born, anyway. Though my husband and I elected not to find out the sex of either baby in advance, I felt like whatever the gender of either child, we would do our part to raise our kids in a manner far away from your basic pink or blue stereotypes. If the baby was a boy, we would openly ban the purchase of camouflage, sports icons, or any sort of toy weaponry. Similarly, there would be no pink outfits, makeup kits, or Barbie dolls for a daughter either. These were the things enslavement to one’s gender would be made of, and I would have none of it. If my son wanted to play with dolls and pretend to nurse them (which he did), he could go for it. If my daughter chose to favor the red Matchbox Dodge Magnum over her tea set (which also happened), I would not stand in her way. There would be no rigid definitions of gender appropriate behavior in this house, including that of toys and clothes.
I don’t know when exactly I revised my views on all this, but I know that it happened, and with each child. For my son, it may have been a little green Old Navy romper outfit that displayed the tiniest little soccer ball in the upper corner next to the logo. It was adorable, it was on sale, and, well, soccer was a nice co-educational kind of sport, right? Strike one. The next item would not be so guiltless. My husband brought home a gopher football jersey for our little guy. Neither of us were what you would call athletes in school, and certainly would not be considered avid sports fans now in adulthood (although I could justify the shout-out this jersey was giving, second hand, to my alma mater), but something about seeing our round, bald, bruiser of an infant in a football jersey seemed.....right. Uh, definitely strike two. The sport-related clothing issue had been nullified, and along the way a few camouflage items made their way into his drawers, but soon I was pregnant again, and dammit, I was NOT going to cave on pink princess crap. No way. Of course, our second child was a daughter. Of course, EVERYTHING for baby girls is pink, and I was ready for this. I had prepared a lovely giraffe outfit of orange and yellow for the baby’s homecoming and plunked her into it over the vast assortment of new clothing people had brought as gifts. During the pregnancy I had insisted that were the baby a girl, no one bring anything pink within our grasp; no Disney, no dolls, no princesses, NADA. This ridiculous charade was continued for approximately two days after her birth. After that, I not only broke down and allowed pink dresses, and yes, Disney icons, but took an almost maniacal pleasure in buying these things for her myself. Just as sure as my son looked perfect in football jerseys, my daughter looked divine in red plaid Gap skirts with matching tights. The clearance sections at Target, Old Navy, and Nordstrom Rack became downright dangerous after a while, as I was completely defenseless against their latest “girlie” additions such as “Cute Bunny” cotton separates or a Polo logo-ed Ralph Lauren sun dress.
I ate my words. Every last one of them. And while I still plan to work hard at instilling a sense of both sensitivity and practicality in each of my children, I no longer take issue with what color they might be wearing as they learn about life. Or if a stray Tinkerbelle happens to find her way onto the wall of my daughter’s bedroom.

Can You Go Home Again?

By Anna Purrington Adams

Lately it seems that I’ve been inundated with songs, media, and thoughts in general that leave me for an overpowering desire for Olivia. Sometimes I wonder if the universe isn’t trying to tell me something about my true wants and feelings. Just as random items like Chevy 454 SS trucks and Dire Straights’ “Money for Nothing,” will always suggest a sort of afterlife communication with my father, John Cougar Mellancamp, sweet corn (although it’s never as good up here), and thunderstorms will always make my heart ache with a longing for home.
It’s during summer that it is the hardest to ignore this need. Just after the brief spring events of blooming crabapple blossoms and lilacs, high school proms, and the Memorial Day holiday it always seems to hit, hard. The trees are suddenly full of leaves, the city’s obsessive lawn care rituals begin, and the delicate smells of spring I so treasure give way to the even more glorious ones of grass, mowers, and grilling extravaganzas.
It’s so different experiencing summer in Minneapolis when you’re not born and raised here. It’s hot, but no one stays outside for it. There is no open swim from 2 to 4pm every afternoon. The younger generation (who has never picked a rock or hoed a weed let alone laid their eyes on the tassel of a cornstalk) is commonly lazy and disgruntled. There are city festivals, but they are short, impersonal, and they only last a weeknight evening. The bigger ones, like the Taste of Minnesota or the Aquatennial are pure madness. There is not really any communication between residents of Minneapolis because it’s too big and people don’t need to communicate with each other. While during the winter it was expected that I’d have little to no communication with my neighbors, in the spring and summer I emerge from hibernation, desperate for human interaction no matter how insignificant. But it always seems that no matter how many friendly conversations you may share, no matter how many eggs you lend or occasions you excitedly gush over 24 or The Sopranos, you still never really know your neighbors. You don’t know their parents, you don’t know where they went to school. You rarely see them at the grocery store because there are six “neighborhood” stores from which to choose. You don’t really bump into anyone renting movies anymore as the Netflix and TiVo revolutions have deemed actual video stores a bit unnecessary. If you have children, you’ll see other parents taking walks down the paths of Minnehaha Creek or playing at various local parks, and should a child fall off a slide or explode in a temper tantrum you may share supporting looks of sympathy with the other parents who have been there before, but really, that’s as far as it will go. It’s very difficult to get to know people here, starting from scratch as an adult. It can be very lonely. I know it’s unrealistic to want to make my life into a Country Time Lemonade commercial, but sometimes I feel like all I get from city life is an overwhelming feeling of void. My brother and I spoke on the phone the other day; our basic query to each other was, “Why exactly are we killing ourselves financially to live here?”
I miss Olivia. I miss Bruce and Sharon at Terry’s, even though I barely know them socially. I miss the sampler baskets that my brother and Weigel used to fry up at the old Sheep Shedde. I miss the pizza at S.A. I miss my mother’s house and the circle driveway with tulips in the spring and zinnias in the summer. I miss reading the OTJ and having the news matter to me. I miss the chimes at St. Al’s no matter how annoying I used to find them. I miss seeing farmers who give you a two-finger wave as their trucks pass you on the road. Sometimes I think what I really miss is humanity, which is becoming scarcer and scarcer here in the metro.
About a month ago, I opened a letter from our mortgage company which explained how our three-year adjustable rate mortgage would be coming up for adjustment next February, and would we please contact them for possible refinance options. After I got over the initial shock and worry over the situation (I had no idea we had an adjustable rate loan, and had it not been the wonderful teachings of Suze Orman a while back I probably would not have been able to grasp why this was at all significant), I had an experience driving home from work one night that changed the letter’s impact a bit. While I always try to remind myself that taking the good with the bad is good for you and is the way life is supposed to go, I began to wonder if the untimely adjustment of our mortgage couldn’t be seen as a positive situation, one that would inspire me to write more, work more, and get my financial act together. Or, (and this was in no small way influenced by Daughtry on the radio) could this be the lead to some other opportunity? Only time will tell. In the meantime, I’m counting the days until the last weekend in July and some *real* sweet corn.