On last night episode of GLEE, two oustanding storylines made me want to cry and cheer at the same time.
First, the always stellar pairing of Kurt and his Dad, a man's man who is the most amazingly sensitive parent to his openly gay son. In this episode, Dad is prodded to have "the" sex talk with his son. He walks in the room with "pamphles from the free clinic" and forces Kurt to sit down and talk in spite of their mutual discomfort. Check it out at HULU at the 32 minute mark.
I cannot say enough how much I value this relationship. Kurt's Dad is so brutally honest about his foibles, but equally honest about his love for his son. He doesn't allow anyone to gay bash Kurt and goes right to the core of it because he used to be the bully when he was young. He expects Kurt's loved ones to stand up for him with no exceptions. The scene from last year when Finn called Kurt a fag, a comment Dad overheard was intense and sad and loving all at the same time. We should all have such parents in our lives.
The sex talk in this episode is possibly the best sex talk ever. Dad bulldozed right through the awkwardness of sexual actions and went for the core of treating yourself like you matter, not using sex to degrade yourself or cheapen who you are. I just sat slackjawed that GLEE had captured the perfect conversation and it happened to be between a gay teen and his Dad.
The other wonderful story was the building tension in the Santana/Brittany relationship. They've made out on the show before with no qualms about what it meant. Santana begins questioning even though she hates labels. In heartwrenching locker scene, she professes her love for Brittany and her absolute belief that her sexuality is fluid, not something that can be pinned down with a word except whom she loves. Sadly, Brittany opts to stay with Artie even though she acknowledges the love is reciprocal. Santana wrenches herself away, utterly heartbroken.
These were amazing scenes and my wish is that every queer kid in America could see their lives played out with such honesty, compassion and realism.
Brave, GLEE.