Fallow Fields

It seems like everywhere you look in the media today, gay people are having babies. The only place gays aren't having babies it seems is in real life because none of my friends are doing it and I'm certainly not having any children and I'm your typical gay man. Like any man though I have the desire to plant my seed and watch it grow but unfortunately all the fields I plant are fallow not to mention callow. That's why I decided to adopt an imaginary child.

She's seven years old and her name's Sarah. I named her after that classic tv movie "Sarah Big and Tall" because she's just over six feet tall. She's a handful. She hates school and lately has refused to go. She wants to be home schooled which I'm completely against. I knew a girl who was home schooled and she was a cannibal. She never learned that other people weren't food. So I told Sarah that if she didn't go to school she'd never learn any social or occupational skills and end up being a common streetwalker. She said if it was good enough for me it was good enough for her.

I'm a very strict dad. I don't believe in corporal punishment per se but take Daddy's martini and you will get pinched. The best thing about imaginary children is that they are so easy to take care of. You can leave them for months without food or water and when you return, all they ask for is a bit of toffee.

I used to leave her occasionally with female friends, you know for that feminine perspective, until this one weekend I left her with my friend Naomi, a single court reporter with no children just entering menopause whose cat had recently died. A perfect storm. When I got back from my holiday she wouldn't return Sarah so I had to call the police. They sent in a swat team but only one man returned and he'd been raped. After that even the bomb robots wouldn't go in. Finally I grabbed the bullhorn and managed to persuade her to exchange Sarah for an imaginary husband and the standoff ended.

Later that night when I was putting Sarah to bed, she asked me where Mummy was. I told her the truth, that mummy had died in a mysterious plane crash in Peru. She said she was glad and that even if she were alive she'd want to live with me. (choking up) That's why you have kids. I asked her if she missed not having a mother and she said, " No. I miss having a father." I said nothing. I figure there's got to be someone in your life besides yourself you give the last word to.