Dads

Sunday, June 15, 2014

Today I am grateful for dads.  I did not say “fathers” on purpose because any guy with a pulse can father a child, but it takes a special person to be a dad.  I am also deliberately not singling out any of the tons of great dads I know by name, young or old, because this is for all of them.  If I named them I might forget someone and that would devastate me and maybe them.

Also, when I say dads I use the term in all forms.  Grand-dads.  New dads.  Two-dad families.  Expectant dads.  Deceased dads are honored along with those males (uncles, family friends, big brothers – the dads of sort) who influence our children’s lives and step-up so that they can have balance.  Non-present dads, whether by their choice or because of circumstances beyond their control.  Whether correct or not, some non-present dads believe they are doing the best thing for their children by giving them the opportunity to adjust to new families without the confusion several dad’s presence.  I don’t agree with this choice, but I do understand the thinking. Other non-present dads might be away in the military, working at a job far away, or incarcerated.  If they love their children, they are still dads.  Most especially, I honor Step-dads, who are the unsung heroes of dad-dom.  It takes a very special person to love another man’s child, especially if the birth dad is heavily involved.  I salute dads.  All of them.

Every generation can name the TV dads who influenced our lives.  They are great, but not real. Anyone can be a dad for a half-hour.  Don’t many of us wish parenting were done in half-hour bites where you could re-group in between?  But a real dad walks the floor with us all night when we’re teething and reads book after book to calm us even though he has to leave the house at 6:30 in the morning to go to work.   He hollers at us for sassing a teacher, on the phone, from Italy, where he had to go for business.  Yet he gets home in time for our birthday tea party and wears a boa and tiara.  A real dad brushes the tangles out of our hair and puts a ribbon on our braids.  He takes us to the park, hiking, fishing, a fair, the zoo, or just along with him while he runs errands, which always ends with ice cream. 

He disciplines us and is firm and just and consistent.  A real dad knows one day, after we are grown, he will find a hundred hammers and screwdrivers we have lost, most in the lawn.  A real dad tears his hair out and rants wildly when we forget to put oil in the lawn mower and it seizes up. . .dead. . .again.  The third one this summer!   A real dad embarrasses us when he chaperones at our high school because he dances with a mop while cleaning up a spill. A real dad teaches us to drive and hands over car keys, even though he wants to lock us safely in our room forever.  He listens to us yammer about music, movies, our lives, even when he doesn’t have a clue what we are talking about.  A real dad will make mistakes because he is human and all of his decisions can’t be resolved in a half-hour.  A dad’s words reverberate in our ears for as long as we live.

This morning if dads get rubber eggs, crocheted toast, and burnt bacon, in bed, I hope they will know how vital and appreciated they are.  Today I terribly miss the ones who are no longer here and cherish the ones who still are.  Wherever they are and whatever variation they may be, whether you’ll see them, talk to them, or just carry them every day in your heart like I do. . . I am grateful for dads.