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Feb. 3rd, 2013 04:37 pmAlice and I are just back from the camp at Purbeck in Dorset. Colin Neilson-Crisp is the newest resident at Moddey Dhoo and is settling in as well as someone two months old can do.
It was harder than I'd expected to talk to his mums.
Only, they'd wanted to have him so much. Not that other parents don't want their children, but in the camps, with the conditions there, having a baby at all is something people really think through. I mean sometimes it happens even when people are trying to avoid it, but not for a lesbian couple. Emma and Julie had to go right out of their way to arrange to have this child, and in the face of, well, all sorts of things that make other people decide not to start a family.
But they understood what could happen to Colin if he showed his magic. Of course, they did. And I think they may be good allies for us, too, going forwards, because they're part of a really interesting community in their camp. They've got a very tight-knit group of friends and they all have sort of a philosophy that they live by that they can change their world if they approach everything with a powerful positive outlook. We were trying to describe it to the folks here at the Sanctuary when we got back and someone called it Militant Optimism, and I think that's it, really. It almost sounded as if they thought positivity could have a sort of magical power against the enforcers who keep them captive there. Anyway, the thing is, they really believe the world is going to change and that there's a future they need to be working towards. And if you believe that, then having babies makes sense, doesn't it?
We met Reg West, the baby's father, too, because they thought he needed to agree, as well. And I'm fairly certain they're going to tell some other people in their group what happened, because it would be too hard for them to lie about Colin dying suddenly. And we didn't tell them not to. I think there's potential there for working with their whole group. Their goals and ours are very close. Alice, don't you think?
It was harder than I'd expected to talk to his mums.
Only, they'd wanted to have him so much. Not that other parents don't want their children, but in the camps, with the conditions there, having a baby at all is something people really think through. I mean sometimes it happens even when people are trying to avoid it, but not for a lesbian couple. Emma and Julie had to go right out of their way to arrange to have this child, and in the face of, well, all sorts of things that make other people decide not to start a family.
But they understood what could happen to Colin if he showed his magic. Of course, they did. And I think they may be good allies for us, too, going forwards, because they're part of a really interesting community in their camp. They've got a very tight-knit group of friends and they all have sort of a philosophy that they live by that they can change their world if they approach everything with a powerful positive outlook. We were trying to describe it to the folks here at the Sanctuary when we got back and someone called it Militant Optimism, and I think that's it, really. It almost sounded as if they thought positivity could have a sort of magical power against the enforcers who keep them captive there. Anyway, the thing is, they really believe the world is going to change and that there's a future they need to be working towards. And if you believe that, then having babies makes sense, doesn't it?
We met Reg West, the baby's father, too, because they thought he needed to agree, as well. And I'm fairly certain they're going to tell some other people in their group what happened, because it would be too hard for them to lie about Colin dying suddenly. And we didn't tell them not to. I think there's potential there for working with their whole group. Their goals and ours are very close. Alice, don't you think?
