I was paging through the local features section in the newspaper (they call it "Life, etc.," which is about as dumb as "Style" or "the only well-written stories in this newspaper" or whatever else they might call the features section), and I came across an advice column. Apparently some time back, this columnist asked for opinions on gay and lesbian adoption, and last Friday she printed a few responses. All were relatively measured responses, but one writer using the name "Save the Children" opined that while adults were free to do what they wanted, children shouldn't be exposed to "certain things."

Oh, my.

Back in the day (say, 1972, when I was two), those certain things included race. I've told the story of my babysitters asking the two-year-old me what color each of them were, and me answering "black" and "brown." My parents taught me that race isn't something that ought to separate people by letting me observe the world. They didn't browbeat me into appreciating diversity. They simply showed me a diverse world, and I reacted accordingly.

These days, homosexuality is definitely one of those "certain things." And I still don't understand what all the fuss is about. A gay couple lives across the street from me, and the lady next door is lesbian. Max talks to them all the time, and he's untroubled by their sexuality because it simply doesn't affect him. They're his friends, which is all he wants to know and all he needs to know. By the time he's old enough to understand what the words mean, he'll know that some of his friends are gay and some of his friends are lesbian. And that's that.

He knows most boys and girls have a mommy and a daddy. Some mommies and daddies live together, and some don't. And in some cases, like his best friend at preschool, boys and girls have two mommies. Or two daddies. And that's all he needs to know.

I should note that Max has taken to calling himself a girl, or, as he prefers, "big girl." He has a baby doll named Jammie, and ever since our second son Sam was born, Max has taken to nursing Jammie a few times each day. He pulls up his shirt, rams Jammie against his chest and, well, nurses her. Then he burps her and switches sides. He knows how to nurse. He's an observant fellow.

My mother-in-law noticed this behavior and got slightly concerned. "You know, Max, daddies don't nurse babies. Mommies do." To which Max answered, "That's okay. I'm Jammie's mommy."

And while Max is well aware he's a boy (he often speaks of his penis with great admiration), whenever he's taking care of Jammie, he's a mommy. And mommies are girls. So he's a girl. A big girl.

Max and his friend McKenley are the oldest children in his preschool class. They rule the roost, keeping the other kids in line and making sure to hold their place at the top of the pecking order. The way they do this is by being the mommies of the class. Well, sometimes McKenley (who is a girl) is the daddy, but most of the time they're both mommies.

And everyone knows it, too. One morning, as I was walking Max into the preschool, a car passed us. The little boy in the back seat, who is in Max's class, yelled out the window, "There's my mommy!" Max just smiled and waved.

When Max first started preschool, he would often gather up all the baby dolls in the classroom and take care of them, occasionally instructing the other kids in the proper care and feeding of said baby dolls. As he and McKenley consolidated their grip on the class, Max didn't seem to need all the baby dolls. Now he's down to the care and feeding of one, though the actual doll changes from day to day. What hasn't changed is the doll's name, which is Baby Jesus.

I don't know where he got the name. The preschool is technically a Parent's Morning Out program at the Methodist Church two houses down from our home. But they don't do religious instruction. I assume he heard about Baby Jesus from somewhere, and since "Jesus" and "Jammie" sound a lot alike, he decided he liked the name.

Baby Jesus, by the way, is a girl. None of the dolls have penises, and so they must be girls. Max is nothing if not logical.

Anyway, now that he and McKenley are so tight, any baby being cared for by one of them belongs to both. One day, as Max was explaining to me once again how it was that he was a big girl and not a big boy, I asked who Baby Jesus's daddy was. "Baby Jesus doesn't have a daddy," he said. Okay, well, I guess that makes sense. Maybe he's picked up on the Christmas story somewhere. Then he continued. "Baby Jesus has two mommies."

My wife Barbara blanched when she heard this. Not because of what the folks at her parents's church (Max sometimes attends Sunday School there when we're out that way) might say if he repeated that, but rather what McKenley's mothers might think. And then she realized that kids will say whatever they're going to say, and there's not much we can do about it.

One day, Max asked me who McKenley's daddy was. I said I didn't know. He asked why. I said that McKenley had two mommies, something he already knew but may not have actually processed before. He thought about it for a minute, and then said, "That's just like having a mommy and a daddy, except that the daddy is a mommy."

That's right, Max.

Jon Worley has a mommy and a daddy who taught him well.