I’m done with men, totally done—I’m going to be gay for a while.

No really. I know I’m on the record as saying that I love men (It’s true). And I know there are a few men (more than a few, actually) who would be very surprised to learn that I am now gay. The narcissist in me hopes they are in mourning.

This may also come as a shock to my family, but possibly not to my immediate family because we have several gay kinfolk around the holiday tables. I love them like I love my own mothers.

Oh, wait a minute…

My husband already suspected my inner lesbian because I have often said that if I ever get divorced—again—I will absolutely 100% be gay. Can you imagine how easy it would be to get dinner ready and say, keep the seat down on the toilet?

However, despite the multitude of men in my life and their propensity for leaving the seat up, my love for cleanliness and order is not why I’m going to be gay. I’m doing it for business reasons.

You see, it is very cool right now to be gay and teach yoga. When I go into my local yoga stores, there are lots of lovely young gay men on the walls being celebrated for their authenticity (that’s code for being “out”), their gorgeous bodies and their yoginess.

On Facebook, every other post is about how cool it is to support your gay friends. Which I do! I love my gay friends and family, and I know all about their struggle for acceptance (before you write in to tell me I’m a white trash suburban piece of crap) because I lived it growing up.

Even Ted talks are dominated by “It’s ok to be gay” discussions.

On the other hand, what is very uncool right now is to be a soccer mom. Right?

In fact, and this is the absolute truth, with God, and even the Wiccans as my witness, and because you know I can’t make this stuff up: I have been told that because I am a soccer mom, I cannot be a “real yogi.”

First, the manager at a la-di-da yoga store who was looking for a weekend teacher, said, and I quote, “Soccer moms are not cool.”

Then, I had a yoga teacher tell me that I could not be a “serious yoga student” if I had to pick up my kids at 3 p.m. OMG! If she only knew I would then be heading to the fields!

Yoga is way cool right now and to teach it, you gotta be cool too. I have been advised to get a tattoo, to get pierced, and to get a young lover like Mama Kardashian (or I might have imagined that part). I have been told if I want to be hip, lose the mother thing.

In fact, my branding used to be the “Yogi, Mother, Muse,” but now I am just the “Yogi Muse.”

I ditched the “mother,” but I’m still a mom. My yoga students actually call me “mom,” because I love them and yell at them with equal measure.

But no matter how cool I try to be, I am also still a soccer mom. I have at least one more year on the fields until my youngest goes to college, and if he plays there, then I am the kind of mother who will travel to watch him. I’m not apologizing either. I’m a soccer mom and my haters can suck it.

Therefore, I am going to be gay for now. I am going to be the “Yogi Gay Muse,” and if that doesn’t bring in the book sales, retreat reservations and fill my workshops then I’ll have to get that tattoo after all.

Relephant reads:

Dad’s Letter to Gay Teen Son Goes Viral.

#LoveAlwaysWins Video Shines Spotlight on Russia’s Anti-Gay Law. {Video}

 

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Editor: Bryonie Wise

 Photo: Bob Bobster