Buying Dad
By Harlyn Aizley
Alyson, 2003.

"Ten minutes after we have slowly inserted and retracted both vials I think I feel something moving inside me. I'm pregnant! Then I get anxious. The incredible hugeness of what we're doing hits and surprised me like all along I had thought we were buying a car…It's perhaps the biggest, most life-altering, irreversible thing you can do.."

In Buying Dad, Harlyn Aizely moves through the process of a lesbian couple getting pregnant as smooth as a baby through the birth canal. Up and down their rollercoaster of "sexual science," the ride is as unexpected as it is intimate as Aizley and her partner (Faith) take baby steps toward motherhood.

As it began with the basics, I felt like I was in sitting on an adjacent couch from Ellen Degeneres and Sharon Stone. But as Aizely moved into private anecdotes and details the audience didn't get in the HBO special, I felt like I'd been let in on a big secret. "Part of me wishes there had been candles, more ritual, not Faith leaving me splayed with a syringe poking out of my vagina while she flossed and brushed her teeth..." The syringe needs to stay in for twenty minutes so all the sperm can make out of the tube.

Not only is Aizley candid in a way only hormones could induce, but she lets it all hang out. From revealing her fears of motherhood and uncontrollable gas, seeing friends (also trying to get pregnant) fighting over anonymous idyllic sperm donors, to letting the reader see the human side of her relationship, Aizley is first, honest, then informative.

Beyond the entertaining, neurotic madness of the narrator's voice, this book is a bit of a learning journey for those of us who've always wondered how two vaginas can create a baby. An interesting nugget culled from the book: there are two ways for lesbian couples to get pregnant — ICI (intracervical) and IUI (intrauterine.) Translated: ICI=turkey baster, IUI=doctor inserted. Who knew? Pick up this book and you will.

This book isn't all dry humor and blunt honesty about buying a dad. Interwoven through the manuscript is a painfully ironic parallel of Aizley getting pregnant and her mother dying of cancer that adds a rich element to the book.

It's no surprise that Aizley does indeed get pregnant; otherwise she probably would've had a harder time selling her we-threw-in-the-towel manuscript. But fortunately for her (and for eager-mother readers) the baby not only turned out great, but so did this read.

Bare Your Soul
Edited by Angela Watrous
Seal Press, 2002.

This "Thinking Girl's Guide to Enlightenment," is an exposé of women's spirituality, offering 25 essayed snapshots from women of all backgrounds and traditions. The pieces highlight the full gamut of beliefs — from recovering Catholics to a post 9/11 switch to Islam to butch agnostics — celebrating women's spiritual journeys.

Angela Watrous used an even hand when she chose the essays, and most of the writing is smooth, accessible and unpretentious. In "Coming Clean," by the editor herself, she says she felt like her spirituality had surfaced like her sexuality. "It felt like there'd never been any decision to make in the first place…the first time I realized I was a lesbian, it happened the same way: an immersion in community, a sudden awareness and, finally, an undeniable pull to make a choice that had already been long decided somewhere deep inside of me."

Bare Your Soul is a balanced, measured and enlightening picture of spirituality amid this third-wave of feminism, although, like other anthologies, individual pieces are hit and miss.
Yet, I enjoyed the hits and pocketed jewels of enlightenment — a shared view expressed in a compelling way; an experience that, although unlike my own, opened a door for me; writing and beliefs that were particularly smart.

Specifically, Maliha Masood's "The Practice of Faith" is a standout discussion of conflict between her rigid Islam heritage and her "rugged individualism" surrounding her in United States. Stephanie Groll also hits home as she explains in "Million Step Program" how, because she had no spiritual foundation, she worked hard to shrink her body from the view of the world. Groll explained how she did it: "Not by starving myself, but by shutting my mouth.

Tanessa Dillard also make an interesting observation in "Church of Godly Men" about increase of not only the frequency but also the strength of her church's overtly prejudiced comments. She said her head felt heavy and twisted as she listened to the sermons, baffled that they blasted gays as vehement sinners, but turned a cheek to the child molesters and scandalous adulterers sitting in the same pews. Equally, she found it alarming that the church supported the patriarchal attitude that women should serve and not speak. She points to these veins within the Christian church as the reason some of the most outspoken critics of organized religion are ex-members.

Bare your Soul is in many ways a handbook of spirituality, yet, unlike most handbooks, all the pieces were written with passion after years of thoughtful scrutiny of not only each writer's internal fabric, but with an awareness of a world not in a vacuum.

Beyond the Closet
By Steven Seidman
Routledge, 2002

The way Steven Seidman compares Ellen's historical coming out on the cover of Time magazine to the mere byline Rosie's coming out was given in the entertainment section of the newspapers, is an accurate analogy of the transformation of gay and lesbian life in United States.

In this coming-of-age book Beyond the Closet, the State University of New York sociology professor takes a hard look at the evolution of the closet. What did it mean twenty years ago? What does it mean now? Not only does he address these questions in a well-considered and astute way, he also offers snapshots of peoples experiences behind and outside the closet door.

Seidman profiles queers and paints a diverse picture of what it was like in the closet, which he defines as "less about denying [homosexuality] than choosing to conceal and mange it. The closet allows one to be in the world as a respected, good person, despite possessing a stained identity. Shame, fear, terror and disgust not only are the emotional stuff of the closet, but sustain it."

A few dry patches notwithstanding, the author's expertise on sexuality and social theory make his observations on historical evolution of being queer in the United States thoughtful and sage — carefully considering for instance, how gays were damned to silence and perceived as aliens in a severely homophobic 1950s and '60s culture. He even points his finger at the government's attempts to prevent the acceptance of homosexuals by taking away basic rights, something that obviously continues to haunt the queer community.

Seidman also takes a look at people who are "straight but not narrow" as well as a young man who is much more ambiguous and interesting than his "heterosexual and proud" stance might lead one to believe.

By Gina Daggett

Published in Just Out, 2003.