Debriefing Diversity Day

Having had diversified, I packed up my rainbows and headed home in the rain.

It was difficult to believe that we had only spent 4 hours at the Diversity Fair at Asher’s elementary school when we finally made it home. I was exhausted from representing The Gays to small children and their parents. I handed out goodies and smiled at every delightful child and tried unsuccessfully to pry Asher off of my person and get him to explore the other tables on his own.

Asher showed me the passport he received when we got to the fair. I explained that he was supposed to go to every table and get a sticker or stamp from each station. There was a continent on every page, and the children would learn where all the countries sat on the maps-because most of the tables represented countries; England, Norway, Mexico, Ethiopia, Turkey, etc.

“Where does your sticker go in my passport?” The children asked. “Yes, well, we can put a rainbow sticker on any page you like because there are rainbows ALL over the world.” I made eye contact with the mom from India as she escorted her daughter to all the tables and whispered, “Our People are in India, too, but we might have a much lower profile so we don’t get arrested,” I laughed to show that oppression in fundamentalist countries doesn’t turn my gay smile upside down. She laughed with me. I’m pretty confident she didn’t understand a word I said.

One of the girls from the Ethiopia Table ran over to check us out. “Which country is this? Is this Rainbow Land?” “Yes, my child. This is Rainbow Land where the sun always shines, the flowers are in full bloom, there is no war or poverty or hunger, and everyone is happy and gay.” No, I didn’t really say that. She made numerous trips back to my table because we did scratch-art projects to joyful music and handed out rainbow lollies and rainbow coloured peace sign necklaces, and she thought Rainbow Land was the best place to be. I couldn’t agree more.

It didn’t surprise me that children were unfamiliar with Rainbow Land. Our own family rarely ever discusses our gayhood. We live in an area where there are lots of people from Rainbow Land, and it all seems quite ordinary. So I was thrown off guard when the occasional parent asked me what my table was supposed to be. I do tend to forget that you can actually live here in Gayville and never have the pleasure of making our company.

“You don't get it, really?" I wanted to say. I had a huge rainbow flag hanging behind me and a poster that said Celebrate Diversity surrounded by photos of same-sex parents with their kids. There were a few books on the table like Todd Parr’s Family Book, King and King and And Tango Makes Three - the true story of the male chinstrap penguins, Roy and Silo, who raised a baby penguin together in the Central Park Zoo. I wondered if it would have been more clear if I had brought a brochure for R Family Vacations or maybe if I a t-shirt with this image:

My faith was restored when one mom stopped by and perused the literature. She was with her husband, but she was no stranger to Rainbow Land.

Mom: And Tango Makes Three! What a wonderful book.

Deborah: Isn’t it?

M: You do know what happened to those penguins Roy and Silo, don’t you?

D: ....no, what?

M: After 6 years, they split up.

D: They did?!?

M: Yup. Sad.

Way to rain on my gay parade, Lady.

Of course, I immediately surfed the web to find articles about the family. Turned out a couple of hostile penguins kicked Roy and Silo out of their nest. Clearly they were extremist right-WING penguins who were threatened by gay penguin love. And as if losing their home wasn’t enough, some tramp penguin named Scrappy from SeaWorld showed up and whored her way into Silo’s heart.

We certainly can’t expect that all gay couples are going to make it-not even chinstrap penguins. Their break up does not take away from the 6 years they had together or the family they created with Tango-who is a lesbian now, by the way. A pengbian? There are 4 other same-sex couples at the zoo including Tango. What’s in the water over there, and can we bottle it up for resale?

In the end, I’m not entirely sure that all the kids really understood that Rainbow Land was all about gay families. I didn’t greet each child with, “Welcome to the LGBTQ Table!” Nor did I ask each parent to sign a petition to legalize gay marriage. We celebrated rainbows and had a gay ol’ time. That’s about all this gay mom can muster for the Kindergarten through 2nd grade population. Everyone else can read the blog.