As parents now
wait until their 30s and 40s to start families, so
too are modern grandparents finding themselves
making this "career change" later in life --
often well into their 70s, when they may not exactly
be in their prime for the job's demands. And thus
marks the rise of the gay uncle -- the guy who spoils you
rotten, answers all those questions you can't ask your
parents, and has you home in time for dinner. But this
modern-day guncles phenomenon presents a major
question: What exactly is it guncles are supposed to be
doing?
I didn’t
have a gay uncle growing up, but I remember the first one I
saw. It was Paul Lynde, playing Samantha’s
Uncle Arthur on Bewitched. No one said he was gay,
but Arthur’s sneering innuendo, campiness, and
suburban gate-crashing had enough cultural signifiers
to raise a pink flag in my 9-year-old brain.
These days, real
gay uncles are de rigueur. At least a dozen companies
sell onesies printed with "I Love My Gay Uncle." A new
children’s book called Uncle Bobby’s
Wedding explores a young guinea pig’s
jealousy when her favorite uncle marries his
boyfriend. There are Facebook groups where teens praise
their GUs ("I’m not gay, but my Uncle Herb is;
yes, I do have a gay uncle!") and a co-ed worthy
cocktail called "the gay uncle," made with Jack
Daniels, cream, and Tabasco. The Urban Dictionary's
definition of the term underscores the ubiquity: "gay uncles
-- you either got one, or you are one -- or both!"
As a guncle
myself, that seems like a good thing. When my niece Amber
heard some schoolmates teasing two girls who were playing
"wedding" at recess, she turned on them. “It’s
called gay,” she shouted. “Get over
it.”
While it’s
nice that gay uncles have become integrated into the family
circle, what’s our role supposed to be?
I have a
master’s degree in early childhood education, and
I’ve worked with young kids professionally for
20 years -- as a preschool teacher, school director,
and youth researcher. I have seven nieces, and I wrote a
book called The Gay Uncle’s Guide to
Parenting. (Of course, being an expert is different from
putting it into practice: The shoemaker’s kids
go barefoot. Child psychologists are insane parents.
You get the idea.)
When I was doing
publicity for my book, interviewers consistently used a
line that seemed to offer a clue: "Gays are the new
grandmas."
At first the
phrase confounded me. Was it a slight on my prematurely
graying hair? My fashion sense? Eventually, I demanded an
explanation.
My interrogator
explained that it had to do with advancing maternal age,
and its correlative impact on grand-maternal age. My
mom -- exceptional in many ways -- was only 20 when
she had her first kid, making her mom a grandparent at
age 39. But many of my friends didn’t even
start thinking about pregnancy until they were nearing 40,
and their parents are all significantly older than
mine.
If you do the
math, you’ll realize that many modern grandparents
are beginning this career change in their 70s.
Even with recent advances in joint replacement,
plastic surgery, and mental-robics, the current
generation of grannies is, quite simply, old. Where my
grandma taught us gin rummy, took us biking and swimming,
and out to concerts -- I saw the Cars with her in
‘84; she and my sister hit the Jacksons'
Victory tour that same year -- today’s nanas are more
physically and mentally frail: forgetful of any
child-rearing tricks they once had, and more likely to
be using a walker than moon-walking.
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Brett Berk, M.S.
Ed., has worked with young children and their families
for over 20 years and is the author of The Gay Uncle’s Guide to Parenting. Visit him at www.askgayuncle.com.