A new LGBT contributor wonders, “What is family?”

No, seriously…what is family?  I ask, because I do not know.

St. Pete Pride is here (it’s queer), its theme is “family” and in this year of my

Very Special Mid-Life Self-Analysis, I find I have no singular “see family” reference in my brain’s dictionary.

I’m not the only one, of course.  I’m confident many of us have our little stories from childhood that provide our hall pass to the barstool, to the cute stranger with an ear, to the three shots of jagermeister.  I’m sure many of us agree, how can we create and enjoy our own grown-up families when we have no fragging foundation for what family is supposed to be, for what it’s supposed to feel like.

This article appears in Jun 17-23, 2010.