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This implies that men have the power to make women gay. And I don't believe it. If that were true, Ali and all the other gay women I know would be deprived of an identity that stands alone, does not require trauma, is not yet another response to men. Women loving women is not about men at all. But that still leaves me wondering: What is it about?

When Ali first came out, I wondered if I could have done something to make her gay. She was born with a dislocated hip and she needed X-rays in her first months of life. What if something happened to her tiny ovaries back then? Did I ask the doctors enough questions? Ali came slowly to the belief that Roy, my second husband, and I would make it. When we told her we were getting married (she was 12), she neatly tucked the instep of one foot over the arch of the other, thrust out her hip and said, "Oh, really? And what makes you think it can work this time when you failed with Daddy?" Could that overwhelming sense of failure have cut off her hopes for a happy marriage? No, it didn't -- she absolutely hopes to find lasting love with a woman. If she had given up on love, she'd give it up altogether.

Time went by and I stopped looking for the causes of Ali's sexuality. I stopped needing to find them as I grew increasingly comfortable, as I saw how little difference it made.I have come to think that Ali's feeling about men as sex partners is like my relationship to peanut butter: I have tried different kinds and haven't liked any of them.

I do not associate peanut butter with any bad memories -- nobody ever beat me while forcing it down my throat. I sometimes wish I could be satisfied at lunch by a simple peanut butter and jelly sandwich. But I can't. Although I have nothing against those who scoop the stuff right out of the jar and lick it off their fingers, people look at me strangely when I tell them I don't like it. It's almost un-American. On long-ago Sunday nights, my whole family would all watch "Bonanza" and have snacks at our TV tables. My brothers gobbled peanut butter and Ritz crackers while my dad and I speared chunks of pickled herring from a small jar. There is no explanation for this, and there should be no judgment, either. It just is -- as is Ali.

But on that day of my divorce, neither her dad nor I knew she was gay. She was still a kid at home wondering about I do's and I don'ts while I sat in a diner listening to her dad's sad story. He had placed his camera near his plate like another table utensil. He could raise his fork, his coffee cup or that camera at any time. I wanted to grab it and take a picture of his ravaged face after he finished telling me all about his lost love and her haircut. Ali still had shoulder-length hair then. I wonder what he thought when she cut it?

Have I mentioned that Ali is beautiful? Today her cropped hair shows off her good bones and gorgeous eyes. Her dad took hundreds of pictures of her as a baby and a toddler. I don't know if he has taken any pictures recently, but he used miles of film on those weekends when Ali and the woman who later discovered she was gay made kites and sand castles and baked cookies together. He never offered any of those prints to me.

I couldn't have looked at them then. I could now.

If she had married Ali's dad, I would have found a way to make peace, because Ali loved her. Like the fine mother she may someday become, this young woman wrote poems and read stories and wove Ali's hair into perfect French braids. To this day Ali keeps the letter this young woman wrote to explain why they wouldn't see each other anymore. She was very loving and careful in her language, and so the letter merely managed to say goodbye. Ali read it and reread it until the folds wore thin. What's amazing to me now is that the letter was written when this woman was just 22, younger than Ali is now.

The woman is 34 now. Ali located her a while ago and called. Sometimes I want to do the same. I'd like to say, "I never should have hated you. I'm so sorry. How is your life? Do you have a partner? What about children? You really ought to have children. Were you surprised when Ali told you she was gay? She cut her hair, too. It looks great. And by the way, what did your mother say when you came out?"
salon.com | March 15, 2000

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