David Minerva Clover

I stand at the ready to remind these adults what ought to be common sense: mind your own plate. Stop policing how kids eat!

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.

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.

Here’s the thing though, hating romantic comedies, and avoiding them when I could, didn’t stop me from absorbing their all consuming messages about love, sex, and romance.

In today’s world, children may be a financial liability, but that shouldn’t make them a luxury item.

Thin women can overeat, and it is seen as a quirk, or a one-time indulgence they deserve, or even proof that they aren’t anorexic. Fat women though? We are expected to constantly prove that we’re doing our best to not be fat.

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.

[CN: PTSD, pregnancy, birth] Something snapped inside me and I was transported backwards in time.

We’re trying to raise him with a lot of options and very few assumptions, but I won’t be mad at you if you call my kid “handsome little boy” or something. It’s fine. People have a hard time talking about babies without gendered labels. Even I have a hard time with it, and I’ve put a kind of ridiculous amount of energy into analyzing this stuff.

However, I do have one favor to ask. Please, for the love of everything that is good in this world, stop calling him “little man.”

I am at the bar, working on a piece about kids’ books, while my wife stays home to mind the baby. The lady next to me strikes up a conversation about this and that. Then she notices that I’m still casually clutching a copy of Guess How Much I Love You?