Families are made of all genders and types of people, bound together by love and eventual deep disappointment. One brave woman, Hannah Little, grew up with two dads and has managed to fall far short of almost all the hopes and dreams they had for her.
At age ten, Little’s fathers enrolled her in ballet lessons, and attended just as few of her performances as any straight couple would have. Little’s strained smile and so-so performance was just as uninspiring as her fellow dancers raised by heterosexual parents. Wow!
At fourteen, Little entered an angsty phase that put her at odds with her incredible family. “I was in a band,” recalled Little. “We were called ‘Take it to the Graveyard.’ My dads came to our first show in a church basement but we all kinda gave up on it after that.”
Her two dads. Would a straight couple have gone to such a show? Absolutely not!
Her fathers’ disappointment continued through college, when she took a year off to travel and came back with absolutely nothing to show for it. “That scared them,” said Little. “I mean, they said it was my life and my choice, but it was pretty clear they would have rather I stayed in school.”
Aw, love wins!
“It’s hard to raise a child in a time of so much discrimination and bigotry,” said Don Little of his revolutionary family unit. “But we love her, and support her, whenever she’s ready to move on from her receptionist job.” What an inspirational dad!
Hannah and her family are bold, living proof that there is no single definition of ‘family’; families are bound together by love, as well as a complex web of shame and resentment woven since childhood. Hannah Little and her father’s story will hopefully inspire future families to live their truths boldly, fearlessly, and with a healthy amount of disappointment in their own mediocre children.
