The Village People

Rosie and Amy* live on an idyllic residential street typical of West Hollywood. The couple’s 1920s Spanish Revival abode is the only home their children (Dan, 8, and Anne, 5) have ever known, and it looks pretty much like every other house on the block. With a white stucco facade and low terra-cotta roof, the home faces onto a manicured lawn. To one side a narrow driveway feeds into a private patio in back -- ideal for family dinners -- and a makeshift basketball court supplies hours of entertainment for the energetic kids.

If it all sounds like a high-def screen grab from a commercial for the happy, normal (queer) American family, it is. After nearly 10 years together Rosie and Amy are like any couple raising kids: They take turns packing lunch boxes and volunteering at the annual school picnic. They’ve also survived “in sickness and in health” to the extreme -- last year Rosie endured a kidney transplant. For nearly three years before Rosie’s surgery, the children’s drawings had depicted a bleak, albeit rainbow-hued, scene: Amy was usually wielding pots and pans while Rosie lay in a Crayola-colored sickbed. These days Rosie’s on the mend and shooting hoops with her kids.

Chris and Jeffrey Hietikko-Parsons with biological mom Jessica Yorba-Mondt

With any good story comes a plot twist. In Rosie and Amy’s tale, it lies at the end of the aforementioned driveway. The charming two-bedroom, two-bath guesthouse is home to the children’s biological father, Rob, and -- two nights a week -- to the children themselves. p

While this three-parent clan may disturb the conventional picture of American family life, it’s by no means unusual. In fact, Rosie, Amy, and Rob just might be the Cleavers of an emerging family paradigm.

In case you haven’t noticed, we’re in the midst of a gay and lesbian baby boom. Sure, lesbians have increasingly been in the business of making babies since the first such boom in the 1980s. It’s been estimated that by the year 2000, at least 23% of lesbian households were raising children. Gay men, however, have been slower to settle down and raise a brood. Whether the lag is due to reproductive hurdles, difficult adoption processes and costly alternatives, or just maybe a hesitancy to trade Bear Week for Family Week, statistics show that’s all changing: With more than 15% of male couples raising kids, gay dads are the new bear daddies.

The Hietikko-Parsons clan at the time of Henry's birth.

Barring immaculate conception, there is no escaping the fact that same-sex couples can’t have biological offspring without at least preliminary help from a third parent. This third parent could be a surrogate mother, a sperm donor father, or an ex-partner from a previous heterosexual relationship. Whatever their method, same-sex couples are forming relationships and building families with these biological third parties, and as the “gayby” boom grows up, these extended families guarantee that the “homonormative” family nucleus -- i.e., the two-mom or two-dad “we’re just like you” model that’s frequently presented to mainstream culture -- is not now and will likely never be the norm in gay society.

Actually, the same could be said for the archetypal heterosexual family: With an ever-rising divorce rate among straight married couples, nearly 40% of all American children under 18 do not live with both biological parents. Straight or gay, conventional or alternative, it’s clear that the American family is a growing and changing breed. Kids of queer families may have the advantage: An extra parent (or two or three or four) to fall back on in times of need, not to mention an inherently creative perspective on the definition of family.