Y'know, it's sorta old-fashioned of me, I know...but I prefer public figures not having kids out of wedlock. Not good role modeling.

Let's hope Dad does the right thing.

There's so much involved in "the right thing" -- formal wedlock is not on my list, except to the extent that it aids some of the things that are.

Do the Right Thing? May I infer you think it's better to raise a child with a Mommy and Daddy? Or are you simply concerned about their legal standing? Sooooo old fashioned, Frank.

NBA style "right thing" means he gets a pre-nup BEFORE the paternity test. And Mommy hopes that Jr. can celebrate his 2nd birthday before Daddy needs a new pair of (strappy stilletto-healed) shoes.

But some people think I'm a cynic. My three year old is celebrating an hour past bedtime adventure as I blog from the Red Lion at the Quay.

Thank you for that uplifting post. A true celebration of life.

Can't you celebrate the fact he cared enough to be there for the birth? Sounds to me he is doing the right thing by being a parent to his child even if he hasn't obtained a marriage certificate yet. Would you rather he get married just 'cause she's pregnant? now that isn't 'sorta' it IS old fashioned, Frank.

Congratulations, Brandon.

Consider me old fashioned, then. I don't mind. I think the institution of marriage is an important one, and it really helps for kids to have two parents (and that certainly includes gays in my book). Marriage is a contract, and sure, those contracts get broken all the time, but I think it matters to kids to have TWO loving parents, not one, and I think it matters to the kids whether Dad's a boyfriend or something more.

I know an awful lot of single parents, and that's a hard road. My Mom became one, my wife Anne was one...even if I'll never be "Dad" exactly to my step-sons, I'm flattered that they refer to me and their Mom and their "parents."

Brandon may be, and remain, the greatest Dad in the world. I hope so. But there are a lot of kids born to single Moms these days, and way, way too many men disappear, with a small percentage of child support ever actually paid. I've had a lot of girlfriends, and a couple of wives, over the long stretch of my life...and, I'll tell you, a girlfriend isn't a wife. And a boyfriend isn't a husband.

Frank is old-fashioned. Really. (I got him into a pair of sandals for the first time in his life a year or so ago). But he's right that two parents make life better, for both the parents, and the kids. It is REALLY hard to parent alone. Harder than anything I've ever done in my life. And, a contract (which is what marraige is) makes it much more likely that both parents will be there when the glow of the birth fades, when the child cries all night or cuts school or...

No guarantees, of course, but intention is critical, and the contract is the best indication of intention we've invented in society yet.

Like Frank, I don't give a rip about the gender of the parents -- just their committment to be there, as family, for that child, for that child's life.

That matters.

a boyfriend isn't a husband.

Every woman should have both.

8c)

a boyfriend isn't a husband.

Every woman should have both.

Hopefully the same guy...