Page 30 of A Little Bit Naughty

The group proceeded in a loose cluster around the area. Isaac, naturally, wasn’t content to just keep up with the group and drift. Even paddling a larger boat with a passenger, he kept zipping between other kayaks to chat or launching off to look at something near the shore and then pulling hard to catch up.

The guide stopped them just below an eagle’s nest and they paused to watch the majestic birds circling in the sky. Everyone was still, soaking in the quiet sounds of water lapping against the sides of their boats and the drip of water off their paddles.

They slowly started up again, still moving quietly and reverently. “Tell me about your name,” Remi spoke into the calm.

“Oh! Well, it was my grandfather’s name. In Hebrew there’s a tradition of naming babies after a relative who’s recently passed on, or at least using their first initial. I was originally named after my great-grandmother, and when it was time for a new name, I wanted to keep something from it. My dead name started with a J in English, but in Hebrew a lot of J-names and Y or vowel names all start with a yud. My mother pointed out that Yitzhak, my grandfather’s name, would have the same letters and honor both of them.”

“Wow. That’s a lot more than meaning that you like to laugh.”

Isaac laughed merrily, just as his name implied. “That’s true too, though I gave you a bad translation last night. It means He will laugh or He will be joyful. Either one. And it’s from a story in the Torah, where Abraham and Sarah are a hundred years old or something and God says they’re gonna have a baby. They both laugh, but the joke’s on them because… surprise! They have a baby boy. So that’s my little joke… surprise! It’s a boy!”

Isaac was hilarious, and also so richly complex. It seemed like Remi learned something whenever they spoke. “What a lovely name, then. I think it fits you perfectly. I had been thinking that you might want a nickname like Izzy when you’re little, but Isaac has so many meanings.”

“No wait, Daddy!” Isaac stopped paddling, completely distracted. “Could I be Izzy?”

Remi chuckled. His baby boy was begging with his eyes, like this was some sort of treat. “Darling, you can have any name you want.”

“I like that name. I just never thought of it.”

“Then Izzy you shall be. Especially since it’s the most adorable name for a little in the universe.”

Isaac’s eyes shone. “It is, isn’t it? I love it!” He resumed paddling. They were almost to the beaver lodge that dammed up this section of the river.

“Good. I was thinking it wouldn’t be Jewish enough.”

Isaac shrugged. “No, Izzy is totally a Jewish nickname. And I’m actually not that Jewish in real life. Names just have a lot of meaning, and something traditional felt right. Like, I’m not trying to make a lot of waves. I just want to be me. But it is kind of amazing that Judaism has some nice rituals around gaining a new name. I went to the mikveh, that’s… I guess a ritual bath? It has to be in fresh, running water like a river, and you get naked and submerge yourself completely. At any rate, I went to the mikveh and had a naming ceremony for it at my shul. It was pretty cool.”

“I didn’t know that Judaism was that accepting of trans identities. That’s awesome.”

“Well, it depends on the branch of Judaism, and then the congregation within that branch. I go to a mostly queer synagogue, and almost all the clergy are queer. When I go back to visit my parents’ shul, people still aren’t quite sure what to do with me. It’s a conservative shul where the women wear dresses and the men wear suits, and only men are allowed to participate in some of the rituals. Even the kippot–” he made a circle around his head to indicate the headwear “–and tallitot, which are prayer shawls, are only for men. So I kind of started doing all of the male roles, and everyone kind of pretends that they don’t notice.”

“That must feel strange. Your family supports you though?”

“My family tries very hard to support me. But they’re not particularly good at it. One of the ways they show their love is by worrying aloud about how I’ll never get a job looking like I do and giving me advice. Before, it was about how I would never find a nice man to settle down and raise babies with, but I think I’ve moved so far off of their spectrum for what that might look like that they’ve stopped bringing it up.” Isaac kept pushing the paddle smoothly through the water, though his foot was tapping too, now.

“That sounds stressful,” Remi offered, wanting to give him the space to continue. There was just so much he still wanted to learn about his baby boy, and he hadn’t realized what a good opportunity the canoe ride would be.

“It was more stressful before. Now they’ve kind of mellowed out. And there’s a small consolation that they worry about my sister like this, too. She’s completely straight, but she’s getting an art degree, so the nagging and guilting can go on for hours. And if it wasn’t about that, it would be something else.”

“So, kind of equal opportunity guilt trips?”

“Exactly. Ooh! There’s the beaver lodge.”

Remi let the conversation go so they could admire the chubby little rodents swimming in and out of their lodge. The guide told them that they had four kits this year. One popped up on the other side of their canoe, to Isaac’s great delight.

He knew that Isaac was an accomplished, focused man during most of his life, which made it so much more sweet when he cooed over the beavers. It was like he just let himself relax around Remi, even when he wasn’t in little space. It was one of the best compliments Remi could receive.

After the group resumed paddling, Isaac turned the questions to Remi. “I feel like you’ve gotten my life story. How about you? Family? Siblings? Religion?”

Remi smiled fondly. “I love my family. We’re very close, and all in the Portland area. I’ve got two sisters and a brother who all have kids, so I’m an uncle to six amazing nieces and nephews. My parents live just a couple blocks from me, and we have dinner together once or twice a week. In fact, I’m missing a family dinner tonight.”

“Wow. You guys sound almost like a sitcom. I don’t think I even know people who are that close with their families.”

“Well, mine are pretty special.”

“And they supported you? About being gay?”

“Completely. Didn’t even blink. In fact, my mother kind of did all of the coming out work for me. I was at the store, looking at these movie posters for my wall, and I couldn’t decide between two of them. Of course, they were both these teen heartthrobs who naturally had to be shirtless and sweaty for whatever the movie plot was. We were walking over to the checkout counter and my mom—completely out of the blue to me—started telling me about some of her gay friends and ended up by saying that she would accept any sexuality from her children.”