Growing up in Bloomington, Minn., I loved the ritual of dressing for Little League - in white socks, blue stirrups, belted pants, a double-knit jersey, and the cap I'd hold over my face to screen out mosquitoes in right field.

I had started writing for 'Sports Illustrated,' which was really my dream job growing up. But the writing probably read like I was auditioning to write for 'Letterman' or '70s-era Carson.

With the exception of undertakers, athletes are the only professionals obliged to feign sorrow on a daily basis, pretending that every June baseball loss is a tragedy requiring library silence in the clubhouse.

The first words Rebecca Lobo ever spoke to me when we met in a Manhattan bar in 2001 were, 'Aren't you the guy who just mocked women's basketball in 'Sports Illustrated'?' I blushed, broke out in a flop sweat and said, 'Yes.'

The widely held belief that the heterosexual nuclear family is best for children has long been used as a smoke screen for homophobia and as a talking point to quash marriage-equality efforts.

Mothering has been the richest experience of my life, but I am still opposed to Mother's Day. It perpetuates the dangerous idea that all parents are somehow superior to non-parents.

I started 'Society's Child' on a bus in East Orange as I was going home from school. I saw a black and white couple sitting there and started thinking about it.

I will go for a simple girl who's completely in tune with me and who gets along with my family.