Happy Father’s Day
Today is one of my favorite “holidays.” Father’s Day is a great time to think about your Dad and what he meant to you and how he shaped your life. My father was an amazing guy and the more I think about him, the more I realize the many things he did for me and my family that we didn’t know about until after he was gone. My father died over 10 years ago of cancer and it was (and is) the saddest day of my life.
He was a true intellectual who never flaunted or discussed his intelligence or even gave it a second thought. He cared more about common sense than academic accomplishments, yet when I got my PhD, he stood up in the crowd and cheered–loudly. Without him, my life would have been very different and not in a good way. I am thankful everyday that I had such a great guy as a dad. When I hear people talk about not having had a father in their life or that fathers are not important, I feel sorry for what they missed, for they have no idea of the magnitude of the loss to a child without a dad. Fathers are just as important as mothers are in the lives of children and no one will convince me differently.
If you have a story or comment about your own dad or your own life as a dad, leave a comment.
This was a very special Dad weekend for me. My twin daughters turned 3 yesterday and then surprised me with hand made gifts for Father’s Day today.
My wife struggled with medical issues and surgeries starting in 2006. In 2008, her issues ended with a final surgery… which rendered her infertile. This was devastating to us, since the whole situation started with a visit to a fertility specialist after 2 years of not conceiving.
The following year, 2009, we met a young woman pregnant with identical twin girls. Having gotten pregnant accidentally by a man who had no business raising children with her, she was seeking a two-parent, married, mother AND father home for the twins, and answered our prayers and chose us. She joined us for the twins birthday yesterday, and she is truly part of our family… our daughters love her as their “aunt.”
The twins’ birth mother could have extracted financial support from the biological father, she could have lived off the system, she could have done both, but she was wise enough to realize that her children needed a mother and a father and that she could not provide that for them.
There is a great deal of pressure on men to step up and be better fathers, but unfortunately, the pressure seems to be more to do so for the benefit of women than for the benefit of children. If children were the concern, there would also be the same pressure being put on women to create a better nest for their children, which means having a father involved more than just financially.
My little girls are my whole world, and always will be. As long as I live and breath, I’ll be there to teach them, guide them, protect them, and love them. And my wife and I will always love their birth mother for filling a whole in our lives, and realizing the whole that would be in the children’s lives if they didn’t have a Daddy.
Mornin’, Helen.
Thought I’d chip this in… we’ve always pretty much regarded Father’s Day as a “Hallmark Holiday,” and not given any real thought to it, as something fairly artificial and pointless. But I was out this morning with the munchkin to get a birthday cupcake for the wife, and I was several times greeted with “Happy Father’s Day.” Each time, it was women making the greeting, and the sincerity was palpable (possibly the fact that I had a three-year-old slung on, over, under, and somewhere-in-the-vicinity-of-my shoulder had something to do with it).
Makes me wonder if, with the increase in single mothers, whether the (relative) scarcity of Dads is causing a shift in attitude.
I know how to ‘hook up’ and cuss a 9N, Dad taught me. He’d come in from the job, roust out the boys, get the cultivators, planters, disk, or whatever he wanted to use that evening on the tractor and get to work. He liked to raise our own food passionately; he liked giving excess away to neighbors much more.
I know about putting fertilizer in the pond, dressing a beef, and scraping a hog (please no, not anymore), Dad taught me. He liked to do things outside, especially from the tractor seat. We had food put away in the freezer; the dog ate real bones.
I know about working on the car, tractor, truck, mower, chainsaw, pump, well, fences, barn, house, sick animals, trauma care (you’re not hurt that bad), and whatever else necessary to be dealt with without calling out the pay-for-services professionals.
I know when you bring the borrowed thing back—if you just can’t avoid borrowing it in the first place—it must be filled with gas or otherwise made as found, but better. I know you take people to the doctor, or to town, or in that day—pick them up walking, without comment or remuneration.
I know a few things in the big list of things-to-know. When I stop to think about the known things, it often started tagging a long with him, not necessarily being of willing mind or spirit. Thanks Dad.
No father’s day would be complete without a smack in the face. Quite a few women are sharing a photo that says: “Happy Father’s Day – to the MOTHERS who do it all.”
I’ll be unfriending anyone who posts this.
Happy Father’s Day to all the good Dads.
Hello Trust,
Funny thing…after I read your comment on went on my Facebook page to see if anyone had said anything about Father’s Day. There was no mention of it at all. So I posted a “Happy Father’s Day” greeting and attached a photo of my mom & dad, smiling in a boat on a lake. Wouldn’t you know, one of the women that I am “friends” with, posted that very notice you mentioned, after I had posted my Father’s Day greeting.
I responded by telling her that it was rude and that all the men who “did it all” weren’t posting this on Mother’s Day, etc. There were three other responses from other friends of hers. Two from women, one positive to me, one not, and one from a male who was essentially neutral.
Just went to check my page and it looks like I have been “unfriended”, which saved me the trouble.
Disgusting.
Today we went Opheim, Montana, (population 85) on the far northern border of the state. This is where my father, Alfred Grim, was raised during the thick of the dustbowl and the great depression. Winters get down to 40 F below in these parts. Many of his family members died during the war. My father became a veterinarian and also went on to get a masters from MIT–he headed up the program that created the astronauts’ food. After a crippling back injury, he was told he’d be lucky if he ever walked again. Instead, he ignored the doctors’ advice and developed his own therapy. He went on to build two veterinary clinics and a magnificent set of log cabins (he felled the trees himself.) I’m so grateful for my father’s strength and intelligence–that he endured and succeeded. Like you, Helen, I’m so proud of my dad. He gave me so many gifts–independence of thought was highest among them.
Hi Barb,
Your father sounds like a great guy. It’s nice that we were both so lucky to have such good role models. Indenpendence of thought is one of the best gifts a kid can get, though it does get one in trouble every once in a while.
Thanks, Helen,
I, too, lost my dad to cancer, back in 1985. I still miss him, and my mom, to this day.
He was a little league coach. And when I was young, he and I used to go out and look for little league games at the local ballparks. We’d go in and he’d find out who was behind, and that was the team he would pick to root for.
His door was always open and when he met someone they were automatically a friend. It was up to them to prove otherwise. But when they did, he would sometimes hurt terribly.
He was everything a man, and good human being, could be and I thank my lucky stars all the time that I was lucky to have the parents that I had.
Thanks for letting me share this.
About 24 months ago, the ex and her husband really started piling on the alienation. Disinvited me from bat mitzvahs, made it very difficult for me to see the kids, extorted money from me if I demanded to see the kids. Taken the kids to football games on “my weekends”, and otherwise rewarded the kids for turning away from me.
(It’s taken almost a year for the courts to hear this, and that’s at $300 per hour of attorney time of course.)
For the past 8 months the kids pretty much have rejected me outright. It’s been four Father’s Days since I’ve really had time with them on Father’s Day.
And I’m not a deadbeat, not an abuser of any sort, and have always been there for my kids. I actually have always been a very good father, providing food and shelter of course, but also teaching them to read, taking them to the science center, exploring lava tubes, all sorts of stuff.
What hurts for me is that when my kids grow up, they will not even think of me as a good father. Because I have been excluded. They will naturally think of my ex’s husband as their father. He makes $250K a year, has a cabin, will given them cars, gives them parties, takes them to football games, and I, eke it out month by month, the majority of my paycheck going in child support to a family with about $325K of income (she is a phd school psych.)
Father’s Day hurts.
Random-name,
That does hurt. I admire you for not giving up.
I know it’s a cliche, but “keep the faith”. I mean it. You never know what tomorrow will bring. And your kids might surprise you. I am hoping they will come to realize the truth. Good luck.
When my father was 13 he lost his mother to TB, his father to cancer and his best friend was drowned. The extended family took him in and raised him, as a result he was always strongly pro family and a very caring man. This is a major lesson that he passed on to me and I hope I have passed on to my children, we remain a very strong nuclear family. When the chips are down there is no-one who cares like your own flesh and blood.
Father’s Day is one of the most painful days of the year for me. My father was a cruel man, mentally and physically abusive, and a drunk. When I was eight years old, I neglected to put a hammer back where it belonged in the shop, so he whipped me with a bullwhip, causing all the veins in my right leg to literally explode under the skin – 35 years later they are still a mangled mess. I ended the cycle of abuse by having no children of my own; the family name will die with me.
Ed, damn. Sorry. I appreciate that you survived. Live a good life pal. God bless and keep you.
Trey
What Trey said.
One thing I learned from my father, grandfather and uncle – how to butcher a chicken. We raised them, cared for them, collected eggs and butchered fifty to two hundred every summer. I remember one day a storm rolled in and we thought we would finish before it hit. We didn’t. I remember the rain soaking me to the skin, water running down my face, and my hands covered in gore. Blowing a drop of water off the end of my nose, I looked at my father and said “things can’t get any worse than this.” As if on cue, a bolt of lightning flashed and thunder rumbled immediately afterward. My dad grinned and said, “try to maintain a positive attitude – things can ALWAYS get worse!” I smile every time I remember that, because he was right, and still is.
My father grew up in North Dakota during the Depression, only managing to get through 8th grade before going to work at a farm. He said that boot camp during WWII was a nice break from his usual routine (the first time he wasn’t hungry, light work, lots of sleep). He got his GED in the Navy, then went to college after the war and got his degree. He went into the Army as an officer when the Korean War started, his legs got severely damaged then. He never got anything for that, even though they medically discharged him. He went back to school for a masters and taught junior high science, just passed away this year.
I never saw my father run. I always saw him in pain, daily changing bandages on his heels and calves, finally having to use a wheelchair. He taught me that pain couldn’t keep you down unless you let it, that as long as your mind works, you can deal with life.
Sometime in the 1990s, I caught two interviews that really impressed me. One was with Margaret Thatcher, the other with Hanan Ashrawi (on a program for teens on Israeli television). Both women emphasized the importance in their lives of the support and encouragement to succeed that they received from their fathers. We all know boys need good fathers, but these women remind us how important fathers are to girls. My father was also encouraging, and I recall with fondness the gifts he gave me: painting my new but used bicycle Candy Apple Red in his shop, and building me a .22 long rifle from scratch with a beautiful stock. God bless you, Abba; rest in peace.
Early in the morning on Father’s day, I took my 5 1/2 year old son and we drove to a hospital where my dad is staying; recovering from an infection that he developed following significant abdominal surgery 2 weeks ago.
We stayed and chatted with him until he needed to sleep.
Then I went with my mother, had lunch with her, and then back to their house and put in a bunch of shrubs that my mom had purchased. Mom usually counts on my dad to dig holes so that she can plant.
When I finished that task, I took my son and got some groceries. Then I went over to my “not relationship(‘s)” house and finished the last tasks related to installing a new toilet in one of her bathrooms. I snaked a sink for her, talked with her and her son for a while and then took my son home. I gave him a bath, read him a book and put him to bed.
I’m never going to have the Hallmark father’s day experience. I’m pretty sure of that right now.
But I know that I wouldn’t have done much of that if I hadn’t learned it from the man I visited in the hosptial.
Listening to my father exhorting me to be like Roark, but laughing his head off when I asked him who is Roark, and refusing to explain who this character was, is a fond memory from my childhood. He never explained who Roark was. He still doesn’t confirm or deny if this is the Gary Cooper or the Ayn Rand version to this day. Son of a …..
If I was able persist and give my very best to my employers as they worked their very best in service to their clients, then I’ll still have my father to thank for. He worked hard and long for his many clients that grew in number as the years went by, attracted to him by his dedication and humility.
I owe him my name that he chose, from the cover of a film magazine showing the first bikini clad Indian actress, in rebellion against the appropriately religious traditional names suggested by extended family members. The magazine angle might be doubtful but I do owe him the hours and years of teasing.
And finally I owe him my very existence as a daughter that he prayed for specifically in all the temples, churches and mosques he went to, just in order to preserve his mom’s sanity; for distributing sweets and candy at my birth in the face of universal jest, shock and amusement at celebrating a daughter’s birth; and for listening with patience, compassion and forgiveness as his own mother exhorted his new born infant daughter to make her father’s life miserable, but spare her mother, because women have it very hard in this world, don’t you know!
Happy Father’s Day!
ke, I think you are the Hallmark father though. Keep taking care of you son man. You sound like a standup guy.
Trey