Date: Tue, 10 May 94 00:51:45 -0400 Eastern
From: deb.price@glib.org

May 9, 1994
Stereotypes are for half-baked relationships
(copyright: The Detroit News, April 8, 1994)
By Deb Price
 
    Dishing out a warmed-over description of Cobbler Fiasco,
Joyce ladled on the melodrama: She had oh so innocently followed
a recipe and stirred long, thread-like strips of orange peel into
a peach concoction. I had taken one bite and brutishly demanded,
"What's this dental floss stuff doing in the dessert?"
    Joyce, telling her tale to a straight woman she thought knew
us fairly well, paused to wait for a sympathetic murmur. Instead,
her listener stared wide-eyed at Joyce as if a great mystery had
just been solved. "Oh," the woman said very deliberately, "so you
do the cooking."
    Suddenly, in that woman's mind, Joyce was Alice B. Toklas to
my Gertrude Stein. Joyce was "the girl"; I was "the boy." And we
had fixed "butch" and "femme" roles that divided power and chores
along stereotypical male-female lines.
    The truth of our eight-year relationship is less tidy and
more natural for us, women with no desire to boss or be bossed at
home. Unlike the heroine in the 1928 lesbian novel "The Well of
Loneliness," neither of us feels like "a man trapped in a woman's
body." And we're not interested in starring in a revival of
"Father Knows Best," which isn't even a popular model for
straight couples these days.
    Instead, we've created a two-headed household, a loving
democracy marked by fiery debates, earnest deliberations and an
occasional filibuster. But unlike our checkbook, our power tends
to stay balanced.
    Like most modern gay couples, we divvy up tasks according to
our individual strengths and preferences, regardless of whether a
job was traditionally "masculine" or "feminine." Joyce takes
charge of bills, taxes, flowers, buttons, stains, vacation
planning, home security and dirty dishes. Meanwhile, I tend to
the lawn, the groceries, home project planning and dirty clothes.
    She fills the ice trays; I fill the gas tank. Out of town, I
drive and Joyce navigates, or we never arrive. In town, She Who
Grabs the Keys gets to take the wheel.
    Now that neither of us regularly works nights, we share the
cooking, except for our rare dinner parties. Then I juggle the
pots and pans to keep from interrupting every story Joyce tells.
Even when I spend the evening popping in and out of the dining
room, no one ever goes home saying, "Gee, I didn't hear enough
from Deb tonight."
    Psychologist Letitia Anne Peplau, a professor at the
University of California at Los Angeles, says research shows most
lesbians and gay men "actively reject" mimicking husband-wife
roles and instead build intimate partnerships that "closely
approximate best friendship" because decisions and duties are so
evenly shared.
    A few months ago, my best pal and I gingerly broke out of the
two-income mold that's nearly universal for gay couples: Joyce
gave up her paycheck to leap into a joint book project. I became
the breadwinner.
    We grumble that my company's family health insurance doesn't 
cover my new "dependent." Just when we can least afford it, we
have to buy private coverage for Joyce. Meanwhile, our
stream-lined bank account insists on casting the deciding vote in
family discussions.
    But the real nature of our relationship remains unchanged.
When I feel a bit overwhelmed, Joyce places my hands on her
shoulders and reminds me, "Four shoulders. You're not carrying
anything alone."
    Heterosexuals, still so often prisoners of rigid gender-based
roles, could break free more easily if they'd learn from gay
couples rather than trying to twist our lives to fit their own
outmoded framework.
    What's cooking inside a gay relationship? Don't bet on stale
roles.