Teazled is not only an amazing little mom-and-mom company, but it represents a cultural shift and an acceptance of LGBTQ individuals. Because, as it turns out, Hallmark doesn’t always “have a card for that,” as the saying goes. But it’s time there were cards for all individuals and families! Enter: Teazled.

“We created Teazled to fill the need for greeting cards for the LGBT community,” Dina says on the video below.

So, it was not only a surprise, but painful to watch as Hallmark launched a “Tell Them” campaign this month. You see, Teazled’s tagline — which was copyrighted in 2011 — is that exact phrase: Tell Them. So far, a cease and desist order has been ignored. But just because they don’t want to acknowledge their wrong-doing, doesn’t make it right. And let’s face it, if the situation were reversed and a little start-up greeting card company was using copyrighted property of Hallmark, ignoring the situation would not be an option.

Want more reasons to support this cause?

• This is a locally owned company. How many times do we Las Vegans bitch that all we have are mass-corporate chain stores and no variety? Here’s your chance to support a business that is right here!
• Supporting Teazled supports local artists. They do all the art and writing here!
• An LGBTQ-owned business needs your help.
• This business is woman-owned.
• The owners are Christians who are active in their faith.
• You can stick it to the 1%!
• Your purchase of Teazled products and support benefit a small business!
• You can stick it to Hallmark, who maybe didn’t have the right card for you because of narrow, hetero-normative, sexist, [fill-in-the-blank] reasons.

Teazled is a special company owned by two really amazing women who started this company — their dream — with money they’d saved from hard work and their 401Ks. They contribute to the community and their church. They are raising their family here. And they work toward equality for all people. In short, these are good people. And they deserve our support.

So, here’s what you can do:

• Check out #TellHallmark and express your reasons for supporting Teazled and encouraging Hallmark to do the right thing.
• Follow Teazled on Facebook and Twitter.
• Post the following on your Facebook/Twitter feeds and on Hallmark’s feed: #TellHallmark trademark infringement is NOT a warm greeting.
• Most of all: BUY PRODUCTS FROM TEAZLED!

*Image used with permission from Teazled.

Happy Weekend!

We’ve all seen the sitcom episodes or even heard tales of parents bullying each other on the playground. It’s a tough and tight space, and not just for the kids. After all, that’s my kid that just got pushed on the ground by your kid. Then there’s the intrinsic competition that inevitably creeps in… my kid can climb those stairs better than his. And let’s not even get into the special circle of hell reserved for debates about high-fructose corn syrup and gluten. Parents can’t even agree on whether or not spanking is okay. The sandbox can be a tricky place for the adults as well as the kids.

And since becoming a stay-at-home/work-at-home feminist, I’ve had many encounters with the playground crowd. Early on I tried joining different “mommy groups” and ventured on to Meetup to try and find other progressive, feminist parents to hang with by the monkey bars. But it was a non-starter. Half a dozen playdates and group-meets later, I have found that there aren’t that many moms at the playground like me. I guess I’m just an eclectic mix of pragmatic (yoga pants and running shoes) and feminist (no, gender does not matter at the toddler age). I know there are other feminist parents out there, but maybe they work or don’t live on my side of town or whatever. And that’s okay… until there’s a problem with another, less liberal, parent on the playground.

Let’s take what happened today: My daughter and I went down the park for a pre-nap run-around.

At 20 months, my daughter is in full-on toddler mode and she loves the park. And since she takes after her father, she is also very tall, sometimes a head and shoulders taller than other kids her age or even ones a little older. Because of her height, she’s a lot more comfortable with her body and can attempt some things that other kids her age can’t (because, for instance, their legs aren’t long enough or they can’t reach high enough). This is a mixed blessing, of course. I don’t have to hunch over when I walk hand-in-hand with my toddler. But I also have to keep her from taking risks that are a bit out of her developmental range without the benefit of a few more months of language skills that many kids have by the time they are her height. (How I envied the mom at the park today who could say to her 2.5-year-old, “Let’s try something else.” and the response was, “Okay, mama.”) My daughter’s language skills are coming, but they are all but eclipsed by her physical skills.

My guiding philosophy with playtime is that it is a time for kids to develop skills and learn about risk, which is a lasting benefit from my years as a nanny. This is not necessarily fun or easy as the parent, as we want to protect our kids from falling down or having disappointments. But it’s how they grow. I do my best not to hover but to be a heartbeat away if necessary.

Unfortunately, I have found — sometimes the hard way, like today — that my brand of parenting at the playground is pretty unpopular. It’s almost routine for me to hear a gasp here or there as I let my daughter climb higher than other kids or don’t immediately rush over the moment she trips (often she gets right back up as if nothing has happened, and that’s a good thing). Now, I’m not talking about letting her do things that I know would be dangerous or to not help her if she has hurt herself. I’m talking about normal bumps and measured risk. Let’s be real: Everything on the playground could be dangerous. You can’t remove all risk or all danger, especially when you add in multiple kids and other variables. But that’s part of what the playground is for — an opportunity for kids to learn how to use their bodies and to grow skills and brainpower. But, inevitably, someone disapproves — “Oh my!”… “Is that your kid?”… “Are you gonna…” — of how far I let my daughter run without me right on top of her or how much I’m willing to let her try using her body on the jungle gym.

Today was by far the worst example of this. We went to a park in my neighborhood and there were a few other kids — conveniently, all right around my daughter’s age — playing. At this park there is one main jungle gym that has a few different slides, a climbing tunnel and something that I refer to as a metal high-beam/metal rope-bridge. At about 3.5 feet off the ground, it’s a metal beam that goes between two slides. (I have a good sense of how high it is because my daughter just clears under it.) Spaced evenly along it are level foot-steps (they are kind of like steps but don’t go up and down) and along both sides there is a series of metal bars that resemble a rope-bridge shape. So there are lots of hand-hold places at lots of heights all along the way and the steps are even and flat, so it’s not that challenging. The only challenge of it is that it is off the ground. To be fair, my husband does not like this thing and will not let our daughter play on it. But I do. She takes to it like water! She hits every step and doesn’t struggle at all, since her legs are more than long enough to reach. Plus, I stand next to her with  my hands out the whole time, because something like that does warrant a bit of helicopter parenting. (I told you, I’m not a barbarian about it.) And frankly, she’s taken headers jumping off the couch (which is not that much closer to the ground) that are probably worse considering our flooring is not nearly as padded as the playground mats.

So, when it comes to this beam thing, I decided to let her do it when I could be sure that (1) she could physically do it with minimal help; (2) she understood that this was an activity that must have an adult present (which she does because she always waits for me); (3) that letting her do it a couple of times gets it out of her mind and she goes on to less risky activities that are more fun for both of us. Plus, she enjoys it.

But today, we were seriously bullied by a couple of grandparents out with their three-year-old granddaughter. Now, this kid hit my kid. This kid pushed my kid. This kid got mad at my kid when she was in the tunnel. And on and on. But I tried to help my daughter deal with the situation, because it’s going to happen in life. I tried to steer her away from where that girl was playing. And we tried to just do our own thing. But this playground just has the one big piece of equipment and these two girls are roughly the same size, so they want to do similar things and are also trying to figure out how to play with other kids. This couple was especially full of nervous clucks for me. In fact, at first it was just the grandmother in the playground and then she went and got the grandfather to basically regulate my parenting! Don’t believe me?

So, the platform to step off onto the high beam thing is the same as the platform to enter the tunnel and a small slide. The girls were climbing the stairs up to the platform and then had a three-way choice: tunnel, slide, or high-beam. As the adult, you can’t be on all three sides but the grandfather decided to camp out right at the high-beam side. So, when his grandkid bullied my daughter away from the tunnel and she was uninterested with the slide for the umpteenth time, she turned to go on the high beam. And since there was an adult there (this grandfather), she just went right for it. I mean, to her, there’s an adult so it’s all good. Now, I move around to the high beam opening and am right there, but not fast enough before this man pushes my daughter backwards back on to the platform! Gently, yes. But pushed, yes!

“That’s not for you,” he says.

Excuse me? Did you just push my kid?

I’m trying to get in to this tight space where the high beam opening is and he is blocking me with his body. He even has his arms up to block my daughter, who’s trying to put her foot out again, and in doing this is now blocking me from reaching my daughter completely. In basketball this would be getting boxed out, which for my non-basketball loving readers means that someone has positioned their body to maximize blocking you at every possible point. I was boxed out from my daughter by a bullying grandpa! Now I’m pissed and worried because my daughter does not understand what is happening and she’s stepping out onto the high beam without anyone actually helping her! I finally had to physically push the man out of the way to get a hold of my daughter and then ask him to move out of my way so I could help her across. Fuck him and his judging attitude! But also fuck him for pushing my daughter and telling her that using her body was not for her!

And let me just say that the only time my daughter came anywhere near hurting herself today was when that man got between me and my kid but was paying more attention to scolding me (isn’t this a bit advanced for kids their age? I mean, my granddaughter isn’t coordinated enough to do it and she’s older…) than actually making sure my daughter was safe. Needless to say we left pretty quickly after that.

I enjoy taking my daughter to the park and I’m not going to stop just because of some judgmental parents/grandparents. But bullies really do take the joy out of the experience. And, let’s face it, they are also potentially taking the joy out of the experience (not to mention some safety) for the kids.

I like to think there's a next-gen Serena Williams on a court somewhere in one of these right now.

In honor of the 40th anniversary of Title IX, today is National Women and Girls in Sports Day. Wow… 40 years. And what a legacy!

While it’s true that Title IX is best known for the legal requirement that academic spending benefit girls and boys equally — which has most notably opened the door to a variety of sports opportunities for girls and women — the 1972 anti-discrimination law also is used to protect students from bullying, protect pregnant women from harassment, and even to require college campuses to maintain a safe space free of sexual violence.

Indeed, thanks to Title IX girls can do a lot more than cheerleading (not that there’s anything wrong with cheerleading). But now girls and women can choose from a whole host of sports. In 2006-07 school year, 41% of high school athletes were girls. That’s amazing!

Now comes the not-so-great news: We’ve still got a lot of work to do.

For evidence, we need look no further than the news that for the first time, female boxers are going to be able to compete in the Olympics later this year. That’s the good news. The bad news? The International Amateur Boxing Association is debating making female fighters wear skirts to participate. What an insult! In fact, you can tell them what you think of that idea here.

All this comes back to that fragile balance between allowing women to fully participate in all aspects of society — including sports — and maintaining the gender status-quo. It’s threatening to some people that women will be boxing in the Olympics. Boxing is for men, right? So the solution is to put the women in skirts — just so we’re all clear who has the mammary glands. Well, I’m no boxer, but I don’t think the women in the ring have any trouble remembering that they are women as well as boxers. And if anyone in the audience has trouble discerning what gender the fighters are, well, who cares?

We’ve come a long way in 40 years, but we still have a lot of work to do. I hope by the time my daughter is my age, she will be laughing at this controversy because it’s so antiquated compared to the equality that girls and women have in sports at that time.

This is cross-posted on The Sin City Siren and is a part of the national blog carnival celebrating Title IX and is in partnership with the National Women’s Law Center and National Women and Girls in Sports Day.

While watching Kourtney & Kim Take New York and Real Housewives of Atlanta (ATL is the best one!) a thought occurred to me that these shows are pretty telling about the hetero-normative value-structure of marriage in our society. I know some of you are shaking your heads.

What could Kim Kardashian’s 72-day marriage say about the real value of marriage in our society? What could the multiple divorce plotlines (and kept-woman/mistress plotlines) of the combined Real Housewives franchises say about how seriously marriage is valued? Plenty!

After all, what’s more central to the American narrative than the White Picket Fence storyline? That picture isn’t complete without Mom, Dad, 2.5 kids, and the family dog. But the White Picket Fence story is just that, a story. It’s not reality — and I’m not just talking about TV. The reality is that Americans are postponing marriage, co-habitating more, and the divorce rate is still very high (with Nevada as one of the highest!).

Because we’re in a presidential election year and the news is abuzz with all the Republicans making their way through the congo line of primaries/caucuses, we’re hearing a lot about “family values,” the definition of marriage (hint: it’s not for “the gays”), and all the ways that women are too stupid to manage their own bodies. If the South Carolina primary results are any indication, news that Newt Gingrich asked his second (now ex) wife for an open marriage, is not such a big deal, which is funny if you don’t remember the Clinton Inquisition. (But it might be a bigger problem then it seems at the moment, since research shows that 62% of Republicans view adultery as a big deal.)

But all of this just points to the elephant (no pun intended) in the room all the more!

Political (of all stripes) candidates trip over themselves trying to show how much they represent the White Picket Fence ideal (and often don’t). Celebrities want to bathe themselves in the spotlight of wedded-bliss of media-darlingness. Even if their marriage crumbles like a house of cards Kardashian-style (or is that Britney-style?) or a mere year, Russel Brand-style.

If you think that pop culture and politics are not mirroring back what our true ideals are, then you are genuinely out of touch with reality:

• One-third (!!) of teen mothers didn’t use birth control because they didn’t think they could get pregnant… Hmm, sound like some Teen Moms?
• Americans are way more cool with co-habitation (especially if it leads to marriage) than in the old days, ala Kim Z. on Real Housewives of Atlanta and Kourtney Kardashian.
• And, let’s face it, we’ve come a long way from the days when the inclusion of an openly gay and HIV-positive roommate, Pedro Zamora, on the Real World seemed scandalous. Well, maybe not a long way. But a lot more people say that homosexuality should be accepted now than 20 years ago.

I’m not saying that everything on reality TV is realistic or even a good example of how people should live. In fact, in most cases I think these shows reveal the worst in people. From wig-pulling to sexist competitions to homophobic and racist comments, there’s a lot about reality TV that is very, very wrong. And not in the good way.

But I can’t help but wonder if what reality TV is less fun-house mirror and more junior-high yearbook.

Happily married, I will celebrate 15 years with my husband this June. He’s my high school sweetheart. Ours is a story that so few have today. It is, in some ways, the White Picket Fence. But because of that, our story is completely different than so many around us and so many people I meet. I come from parents who have divorced many times over. And at the age of 35, I have more friends in my peer group who are or have been divorced than not.

This is not about touting my life or putting down anyone else. Marriage, like becoming a parent, is a deeply personal experience (and one that should be allowed for all people). And each individual has to decide if it is right for them. Each marriage has its ups and downs and only the people in it can decide if it is successful and happy. And it’s nobody’s business but those people.

But reality TV turns this personal experience into a very public spectacle — from love and courting to engagement to marriage and divorce — it’s all on display. People can live-tweet their opinions while the episode about someone’s life airs.It’s almost macabre to me to see the tweets scroll by on E! as the latest Kardashian episode airs, in which Kim tearfully tells her sister that she doesn’t want to be married anymore. Indeed, it reminds me of when I was in junior high and witnessed my friend breaking up with a boy I liked.

Now, I realize that almost all reality TV is staged in various ways and even scripted at times. I am not suggesting that what we see in reality TV is pure, unedited documentary. But there is only so much you can script and strategically frame. Some of what gets captured is just who those people are. Nobody is “on” all the time!

So when Kim cries to her sister, there’s a part of me that is thinking, “I didn’t know you were such a good actress.” But there’s another part of me that feels like even though the scene might be staged for full effect, that her remorse for being in that situation might just be coming from a very real place. And that part of me, the part that sees the humanity in these reality TV stars, feels bad. It feels a little like misery mining. Are any of these reality TV participants ever really paid the full value for how much of themselves they give away? Is being famous worth it? Because after the cameras are gone and they are alone with themselves, I wonder if there is ever a moment when they think that maybe, just maybe, the private spaces of their lives was not worth some (fleeting) money or some (fleeting) fame.

But in the meantime, I think reality TV says a lot about our values. The pandering, the staging, the egos, the fame-seeking manipulation, the lowest-common-denominator plotlines… it’s all just giving us what we want. And Americans are nothing if not narcissists!

I told you reality TV was my guilty pleasure. It makes me feel so guilty I won’t be able to watch anymore… until the next time I get sick.

Cross-posted on Fem2.0.

These very humble origin stories make athletes intoxicating heroes. And that’s why they must be held accountable when they stumble or fall. They must be made an example, because they are the what we wish we could be on our best of days.

And we’ve seen that play out in almost every major sport:

• Football star Michael Vick‘s animal abuse
• Basketball star Kobe Bryant’s recent hate speech directed at a ref
• Baseball’s Mel Hall is currently serving a sentence of 45 years for rape and sexual assault
• In fact, see a list of crimes by pro athletes across multiple sports here

Surely, in huge professional sports clubs like the National Football League and the National Basketball Association, there will be a few bad apples or bad scenarios from time to time. What matters is how those events are handled. And whether it’s because of a sense of right and wrong or merely a glance at the bottom line, major sports franchises, players, and organizations are looking at the issues of hate speech, sexual assault, and even bullying with a critical eye. Last year, NBA Commissioner David Stern said that professional athletes are role models and that hate speech cannot be tolerated.

The fact that professional sports organizations are publicly saying that hate speech is wrong is important. And meaningful. This is the responsibility part of being a hero.

And this is why it’s time for the UFC to step up.

In November 2011 I joined the fight to get the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) to enact a code of conduct, following a rape joke tweet by fighter Forrest Griffin. But since then, there’s been a spate of offensive tweets and public comments joking about rape and the sexual abuse scandal at Penn State. Meanwhile, they have had what can almost be called a legacy of anti-gay public remarks and outbursts.

The UFC has signed a reported $700 million deal with FOX Sports and will premier in prime time this year. Their ubiquity is a sign that they are entering the Big Leagues of sports. I can’t turn on the TV or drive down a freeway without seeing some sign of the UFC. So it is time that they act like they are in the Big Leagues and enact a code of conduct, similar to those of other major sports organizations including the NFL and NBA.

As the survivor of sexual violence, this cause is very personal for me.

You see, UFC fighters are rewarded for the popularity of their tweets and the effectiveness of their use of social media. There are monetary bonuses, in fact. So, when Forrest Griffin, Miguel Torres and Rashad Evans joked about rape — each of them making direct or indirect illusions to the Penn State scandal — it is more than just offensive (although that would be enough). It is as if the UFC is rewarding the behavior of perpetrators of sexual violence. (Interestingly, Griffin was rewarded as one of the most creative users of twitter!) When Rashad Evans joked that he was going to, “put my hands on you worse than that dude did to them other kids at Penn State,” well, that was like joking about the man who put his hands all over my body. Look me in the eye, Mr. Evans, Mr. Griffin, Mr. Torres, and yes, even Mr. UFC President Dana White, and tell me how it’s funny that a man put his hands all over me when I was a child.

The only way we change attitudes about sexual violence is through public discourse and to act as a society to stop it. And there is evidence that awareness campaigns and calls for greater societal standards does change minds — just look at the evolution of “wife beating” to domestic violence and the Violence Against Women Act. In fact, VAWA has been helpful on the sexual violence front, too. (Report, PDF)

Joking about rape and off-color remarks about sexual violence are not only offensive, but they are deeply hurtful to those who have survived such experiences. It can be a trigger for survivors to feel a whole host of difficult emotions, including anger, sadness, depression, shame, and frustration. For society as a whole, it is a terrible marker for the pervasiveness of rape culture and its bullying effect on the hearts and minds of women, men, girls, boys, transgendered individuals, LGBT people and more. Joking about rape and sexual abuse is an admission that taking away someone’s power is not only “funny” but somehow acceptable and even encouraged.

If you feel like me, that it’s time the UFC grew up and enacted a code of conduct, please take a moment now and sign this petition.

Cross-posted on Change.org’s news feed and The Sin City Siren.

So, yes, I was a nanny. I put myself through college working as a nanny and maid. I scrubbed baby’s butts and I scrubbed toilets and just about everything in between for an honest buck. In the space of about four to five years I worked for four families. With each family, no matter how many tantrums (from kids and from adults!) or missed attempts at the potty (I potty trained at least 5 kids by the time I was 21… and I didn’t have a child of my own until I was 33!), it seemed impossible for me to not fall in love with the kids. All my kids. I had about 10 kids in my nanny years, and that’s not counting all my kids when I was a preschool teacher after college.

I think my experience encompassed a pretty wide spectrum in terms of the lifestyles and socioeconomic status of the families — from food stamps to crockpot delight every night to co-op-grown organic-only hippies. There were single mothers and married couples. Although, interestingly, one of the married couples lived apart in completely separate houses because, “that’s what works for us.” (This was in Oregon, so it actually didn’t seem that strange to me.) There were parents who barely cared if I took their kids to the park and there were parents that wanted an itinerary and to make sure it was suitably varied and included enough educational experiences, including making sure that no two days were exactly alike (really?!). There were parents who would have used a nanny-cam, if it had existed in the early to mid-1990s. And there were those who really did fold me into the fabric of their family.

It’s a tricky thing being a nanny — or a maid, for that matter.

When you work in someone’s home, you are in their most private sanctuary. You are in a very intimate space. And the greater the role you play in that space, the more intimate it gets. For instance, for some families I only did nanny duties — kids only. This is still a very important job, to be sure, but in the kids-only homes it was much easier for my employers to put a wall between me and them. In the homes were I was only a nanny, it was always more clear to me that I was, “the help.” It is far more intimate for your employer when you are changing their bed linens and doing their laundry. When you’ve touched someone else’s underwear, things change. So, it was always far more involved for me when I did more than just nanny. In the homes where I cooked, cleaned, performed pest control (if I never touch another mouse again…), and washed the dishes from breakfast… you become much more indelible in the household and it leaves a much bigger footprint in your life.

One of the most emotional experiences I had as a nanny was when I worked for the State of Oregon foster care system. They would give you all the basic child care certifications and trainings (CPR, etc.) and then basically hire you out to different families who had foster kids. You could turn down jobs, which I did sometimes because they conflicted with my school schedule or were too far for me to walk or take the bus to (I didn’t have a driver’s license until I was 19… long story). But in the end, I accepted a job at probably the last home that any of the other care workers wanted. Indeed, when I interviewed the single-mother told me that she had already gone through several workers who found the situation in her home too much to handle. Part of me took the job just because it was a challenge and part of me took it because of the look in that woman’s eyes. You could see all over her face how much she loved each of her nine kids. Yes, NINE. And only three of them were foster kids! In fact, she worked as a social worker in another part of the foster care continuum — the side of the department that evaluates removing kids from homes. Holy crap.

So, I took the job with the nine kids (over a handful of jobs that had one or two kids). Was I crazy? I would ask myself that question sometimes daily as I walked the three miles to her house in the rain (it was Oregon). I think it was like that bumper sticker: You don’t have to be crazy to work here, but it helps. And it didn’t hurt that she paid extra on top of my regular wage (my paychecks came from the state of Oregon at a set rate) to get the housekeeping done. Ah money, the great motivator of college students everywhere.

My foster care family was indeed large and very busy. Luckily, the six oldest kids — even the youngest were a bit older than the foster kids — were almost entirely independent in their activities and school work and a couple of them were teenagers. The mother was very clear that I did not have to clean anyone’s room who was over the age of 10, including hers. So this removed about half the house from my concern. But that was a good thing because — God help me — the messes nine kids can make in a kitchen and bathroom (there was only one)! The house did not have a dishwasher! Or rather, the dishwasher was me and sometimes I would spend two hours at that sink. Bleh! There were so many dishes and so much to clean up in the kitchen, bathroom and living room that I had to set a schedule, including activities with the younger kids and the foster kids.

And that brings me to the wildcard of the whole situation. My foster kids — three siblings — were all under the age of four. The two youngest were still in diapers (one was being potty trained). The oldest one was about three and had the most raging case of ADHD I have ever seen. The kids had been taken away from their mother, who did meth while pregnant. My toddler was my wildcard. On a good day a toddler of perfect health and coming from a warm and loving home can be as predictable as a hand grenade. This little foster girl, let’s call her Carrie, was so sweet and charming that it just about broke your heart that she struggled so much with ADHD, her dosing on Ritalin, and frankly just to keep a coherent stream of thoughts in her head. She was smart. But the hyperactivity and attention deficit problems were so extreme that it would just rattle the wits right out of her at times. It was a struggle with her medication, too. She hated taking it because it made her feel weird and she didn’t want to eat (she was so skinny it kind of made you nervous just looking at her). But without it… It was so terrible that even she would be crying, unable to control herself, her thoughts or her body. You could just look in her eyes and see the frustration. Of course, the only days she missed her medication were days she had visits with her biological mother, which only made it more difficult on her. She was such a tiny girl, struggling against pretty stacked odds, and without the maturity or life experience it probably takes to deal with everything that was on her plate… It just made my heart hurt. (And, I admit, sometimes my head hurt.)

Added to this was the stresses of the household’s financial situation. The single mother I worked for couldn’t really afford to be a foster parent. She had only taken the three siblings because they couldn’t find a placement that would keep the family together (and with such mitigating factors). She had fallen in love with little Carrie, because everyone who met her did. It wasn’t her fault, after all. My employer was in over her head as a single mother to six kids on a social worker’s salary, but she felt it was her responsibility as a good person to do what she could. But there were days I’d show up and the small house would be dark and cold, because the power had been shut off. (I was prepared with round-robin sing-alongs and games of Duck, Duck, Goose.) And more often than not, I know my employer went to be without dinner, so that all the kids could have something on their plates.

There have been times I have told this story to people who have said to me, “Well, what was she doing with all those kids, anyway? Why did she take in more if she couldn’t afford it?” My response, is always the same: Why do you think? She was raising her six kids after a divorce and through her work saw three little kids who were going to slip through the cracks of the foster care system. If someone who works in the system can’t help them… really, who else was going to help them? Obviously, no one else had stepped up or matched the task or they would have been placed somewhere else. My employer wasn’t delusional, she was guilty of caring about people. She herself told me that she knew she was in over her head, but she just couldn’t find a home for those kids. She was trying. But where else should those kids have gone in the meantime? At least where they were, they were surrounded by very loving people and they were never alone. If anything, the failing that this story highlights is that of our foster care system, not this one woman.

The other thing that people say to me sometimes is that she was being decadent by hiring someone to come in and help out. I disagree completely, even more so now that I am a mother. Just my one kid wears me out! I can’t imagine NINE kids. Nine to one is a really tough parent-to-kid ratio! And the fact of the matter is she paid me about $60 a week to get some help around the house. She could come home at the end of the day and have a clean kitchen (with no dirty dishes and no dead mice in the traps), a clean bathroom and dinner started. This freed her to actually enjoy some time with her family, because she really did love all her kids and they loved the hell out of her. Maybe that money seems extravagant when you can’t pay your light bill. But truth be told, those kids didn’t seem that phased by the lights being out. (Even winter in Oregon isn’t that bad.) But when their mom was really stressed out or grumpy from a hard day, that made them feel awful.

Maybe because of the deep emotional attachment I had at that family, the next place I worked, which was my last as a nanny, was a private placement. Even though I loved Carrie and all the kids I worked with in the Oregon foster care system, it was really tough work. Those kids were dealing with really hard situations, some of which were a bit too close to my own traumatic childhood experiences. In some ways it was very healing to me to work in that dynamic. I felt like I was able to be there for kids who had so few quality adults in their lives. I could be one of the new people in their lives who were finally telling them they were smart and amazing. And I certainly spent time rocking children in my lap as they wept and raged at the circumstances of their lives. “It’s not fair!” They’d inevitably say. And all I could say was, “You are absolutely right. It’s not fair.” As rewarding as it was to help those kids in whatever little ways I might have done, I was ready to move on to homes with (hopefully) less messy emotional entanglements.

I knew that the Astrologer’s house would be different as soon as I rounded the block and took it in from the curb. It was a beautiful Mission home painted in a fresh, crisp white with a yard full of wildflowers — the kind that are supposed to look like they just sprung up there but you know that someone spent a lot of time cultivating. There was a swing on the porch. And when I crossed the threshold — even though there were three children at home — you could hear a pin drop on the immaculate hardwood floors. This was how the other half lived! My charge at this home was a precocious and utterly adorable three-year-old I’ll call Beatrice. She was quick as a whip and had this really fun vibe all the time. She was spunky and chill all at the same time. The woman of the house, who was my employer, was an astrologer. She had Beatrice later in life in a second marriage (to the guy who lived in his own house) and her older children were old-soul teenagers that I was not to be concerned with (her words).

The Astrologer was by far the most strict employer I ever had. She worked from home in a back office — although I was told to act as though she was not there unless under dire, emergency circumstances — so there was always the off-chance she might ramble through and critique my work. And she was definitely someone who required stiff boundaries between employer/employee. By then I had already been taking care of other people’s children for a long time and in much more challenging circumstances, so some strict rules was a piece of cake for me. (Although I did have to stifle my laughter when the Astrologer came out of her office one day and told me that the children’s music I was letting Beatrice listen to was too immature, because they were encouraging her to have a broad pallet. She expected Mozart, not “The Wheels on the Bus.”) But Beatrice was such a doll, that the whole job felt kind of like, well, taking candy from a baby.

After so many hard jobs, it was nice to end my nanny career with Beatrice, spending our days blowing bubbles in the wildflower yard and drawing with chalk on the driveway. Certain days of the week her dad would peddle up on his bike and strap her in to take her to his home in the country where I imagined her to roam free, running all over. I felt a little envious of Beatrice, who was definitely growing up surrounded by love without any of the hardship I, or many of my previous charges, had endured. True, she had a very strict mother with high standards. But there are worse things. A lot worse.

By the time I said goodbye to my last kid I had been peed on, pooped on, and puked on more times than I can even remember. I had wiped so many faces and butts. I had cleaned so much PB&J out of heads of hair and off of walls. I had weathered the frustrating season of potty training. I had made myself a chameleon to so many different parenting styles and discipline choices — which you have to do in that role. Because even if someone else’s child starts calling you “Mommy,” which more than one did, or when they tell you they love you… you are still not their parent. And you will still get fired if you do it “wrong.”

What I learned then and what I know now is that there are a lot of ways to do it “right” if it’s right for your child(ren) and your family. But that doesn’t make it easy.

I see some of these experiences with fresh eyes now that I am a mother. Like today, when my own toddler would not stop jumping off the couch! Every time there would be a jump – splat – cry. Jump. Splat. Cry. Over and over. I kept trying different methods. I should be good at this, I kept thinking. My specialty used to be toddlers! I redirected her away from the couch. Fail. I scolded her. Fail. I gave her a time out. Fail. I took her in another room. Fail. I even swatted her butt. Fail. (It was an extra fail for me because I do not like spanking as a punishment. And she just laughed at it anyway.) Finally, I just vented my frustrations on Facebook, hoping some of my parent friends had some magic beans. But all their advice were things I already knew. I guess it was validating in some ways — I do have training in early childhood development, no matter how ancient — but no less frustrating as a parent. Sometimes you just have to let them crash and cry. It’s something I would tell my employer/parents from time to time when one of their children came home from the park with a boo-boo. Sometimes kids fall and hurt themselves. It’s part of the developmental journey. But oh how much harder it is for me now that I am the mom!

Maybe there’s a lesson in this as the parent, too. Sometimes we crash and cry. It’s part of our developmental journey, too.

How about this sex-positive, shame-free directive:

It is nobody’s business but your own how many people you’re having sex with or how much sex you have. And you don’t deserve to be hated on for being sexually active.

Here’s the video:

Seriously, how amazing is this girl? And how can I make sure my daughter turns out equally amazing (and with a truly great understanding of the institutional systems in our society that hurt women — at the age of 13!)?

PS: Speaking of awesomely enlightened teens talking about rape culture, check out this post by a teen talking about why people shouldn’t use the term “rape” as slang.