Lessons in Funny Feminism from My Mother

I’m hilarious.  This is a fact.  I also have strong feminist sensibilities.  Put together, those qualities make up a pretty excellent person.  (Humility: not one of my virtues.)  But I can’t take credit for those qualities all on my own.  While they have developed and grown over time, I can safely say that I would not be the feminist or humorist I am without the influence of my mother.

My mom didn’t change her name when she married my dad.  I didn’t realize that this was a big deal until I reached my playground years and met my friends’ parents, and noticed that their mothers and fathers had the same last name.

“Why don’t you and Daddy have the same last name?” I asked her.

“I didn’t change my name when I married your father,” she said.  “This is the name I was born with, and this is the name I’ll die with.  It’s part of who I am.”

It seemed like such a little thing…and yet it wasn’t.  My mom kept her name because she held onto a crucial part of her identity.  She didn’t become a different person when she married my father.  Every time she made an irritated face and complained when she received a piece of mail addressed to “Mrs. [My Dad’s Last Name],” I was reminded of that.

When I was a young girl, I thought that the practice of women keeping their last names when they married was the norm.  It wasn’t until I met other moms and dads that I realized it wasn’t.  I wish it were the norm.  But it was nice having a mom who broke those rules.

As I grew older and became interested in boys, I talked with my girlfriends about our crushes.  My friends would try to pair their first names with their crushes’ last names to “see how it would sound,” but I never participated in that part of the game.  The idea of changing my last name when I got married never even occurred to me.  It still doesn’t.  If I met Darren Criss and he asked me to marry him, I would only say “yes” on the condition that I could keep my name.  If he didn’t agree, I would say, “See you later, sexy hobbit.  Let me know when you’re finished with A Very Potter Threequel.”  Not even those gorgeous features and that voice like buttah could make me give up one of my core principles.  Besides, Mom would never forgive me.  She couldn’t run for Vice President if her daughter became a sellout.

Oh yes, I forgot to mention that my mom ran for Vice President back in 2008.

You see, back when Sarah Palin was first selected as John McCain’s vice presidential candidate, many people were questioning her qualifications for the office.  They didn’t feel she was experienced enough.

My mom took a different approach to this debate.  She argued that Palin’s qualifications were certainly good enough to make her a serious candidate for the vice presidency.  And to prove her point, she got her hair did (as Tracy and Angie Jordan would say) in a Palin-like ‘do, dressed in a sharp business suit, stood in front of an American flag, and took her picture.  She emailed this picture to all of our family and friends, announcing her run for Vice President of the United States…because she had roughly the same amount of experience as Sarah Palin.  After all, they both had sons with disabilities and the same understanding of foreign policy and affairs.

Obviously, the picture wasn’t enough.  She had to write a campaign fact sheet, stating all of her political beliefs and how she was just as qualified as Sarah Palin for this position.

Looking back, it seems to me that Sarah Palin’s rise to prominence was not very good for anyone in America (except Tina Fey), but then I think of my mother’s campaign and think, “Damn, my mom is funny.”  I don’t often give her enough credit for her humor, but the phony campaign so amused me that I wished I had thought of it.

So thanks, Mom, for your feminism and your great sense of humor.  This post is for you, and is no way in lieu of a real gift that I was too cheap to buy.