David Minerva Clover

We compare birth stories like war stories. Twelve hours of labor, 32 hours of labor, three hours of pushing, we fall into the trap of trying to one-up each other. So yes, I can see why, to a parent-to-be who is enthusiastically anticipating pain relief, the refusal of an epidural might seem like a bit of a hero complex. And maybe for some people it is! But it’s none of your goddamn business.

My kid, who turned three the day after Mary the duckling died, wasn’t old enough to get any of it. Yet talking to toddlers about death is part of life.

I think kids and parents need old school trick-or-treating. I think it has a value far greater than the sum of its candy. I love trick-or-treating!

I don’t get out much — and it’s not because I don’t have a sense of adventure or don’t care about learning about the larger world: It’s because I’m broke.

People see a baby and immediately imagine that the kid must have a mother and a father, who are probably married, who made that baby with good ol’ fashioned P-in-V sexual intercourse, most likely in the missionary position.

Although the hunt for the perfect outfit at the thrift store was a thrill when I was thin, as a fat person, the hunt was just downright depressing.

After the solstice, the light very slowly begins to return, and every day is a little longer. Yule is a promise: winter sucks, but spring will come again.

Despite our relative insulation from homophobia, my wife and I are not unaware of the situation. There are plenty of people in this country who don’t believe that we have the right to exist, to be married, or to raise a child together.

One of the most insidious things that patriarchy does is the complete and utter devaluation of anything that is considered “women’s work.” Not only does patriarchy limit what women (and all trans and nonbinary folk) can do in the world, it also takes what we do manage to do and tells us it isn’t worth anything.

I expected it was only a matter of time until someone sent it my way. I mean... friends have even called my relationship with my wife “inspirational.” [...] [O]nce I noticed that I still hadn’t been invited, I started to notice something else: Everyone that I saw posting “love your spouse” pictures was straight....