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Queer Eye for the Straight Dad?
By Linda Sharp
I've often said that God knew what he was doing when he sent three daughters into my life. I am a born Barbie Doller. I love playing dress up with them, doing their hair, going shopping, gossiping, etc. Mothering my own sex is something I am supremely good at and comfortable with. Then there is my husband, the sole "Y" chromosome in the body of our family.
In the beginning, it became quickly apparent that he was out of his element. With only a brother in his sibling bank and a frat house full of "brothers" beyond that, girls were still (and remain) quite a mystery to the man. Asking him to dress a baby for an outing ensured a onesie and possibly some pants. Forget matching anything beyond what I had Garanimaled together in the dresser for his benefit. Frilly diaper covers, hair clips, tights? Not a chance. And he had a severe aversion to those elastic headbands things, saying they made babies look like they just had brain surgery.
Not that he needed a fashion lobotomy.
On the contrary, this is a man straight from the covers of GQ (although like any man, his underwear is air conditioned and held together by little more than dryer static). He enjoys shopping for himself, cuts a stunning figure in a suit and tie and quite frankly, still turns my head and the heads of anyone we happen to pass.
As the years have passed and the girls have grown beyond Barney and frilly pants, he has gamely tried to keep up. More out of survival than actual interest, he has learned lyrics to virtually every N'SYNC song, sat through A-Teens concerts, knew when Britney Spears was beginning to fade from the radar and when Hillary Duff was starting to emerge and can actually tell you the plotlines on the soap opera Passions.
He has attended tea parties, kept up with which boys are on the Hot List at school, come back-to-school shopping every year (his role? Sherpa), can tell you exactly what colors Clay Aiken's hair was in every episode of American Idol 2, knows all the characters on The Lizzie McGuire Show
