Toddler Christmas Outfits

Father's Day: Who Can Take His Place?

Dear Fellow Dads,

   I greet you with affection this warm Father’s Day morning from the depths of my beloved Adirondack chair in the backyard — where, with coffee in hand, I’ve been listening to the dawn birds and thinking about the state of modern fatherhood.

Several things come to mind.

First off, you yourself may be taking a well-deserved sleep-in this morning. If so, brother, don’t let me disturb your well-earned rest. Snooze on! I’ll tell those crazy birds to pipe down.

Secondly, I do hope you get something nice from the home crowd this day — real blueberry pancakes, perhaps, or a lovely clay ashtray that looks like something a cow left in a pasture. At the very least, some cheap cologne and a necktie you wouldn’t wear to a clown convention. As we dads know better than most, it’s the thought that counts — especially these days.

To hear some people tell it, we are an endangered species, maybe even an unneeded extravagance. Not long ago, I heard part of a report on NPR, for instance, soberly asserting that if present social trends continue, close to half American households will soon have no father figure in them.

I regret to say the “experts” commenting on this trend didn’t seem overly worried about this fate, pointing out that “other” members of the increasingly diverse modern American family will simply take up the slack and fill in the roles that have been occupied by dads since we began walking fully upright.

This got me thinking about where you’d be without your dad, and me without mine. Maybe yours happened to be a peach of a dad. Or maybe he wasn’t such great shakes. But he was your dad, and I’ll wager he taught you far more than you realize. Carl Jung said children dream their fathers’ dreams — that it’s mothers who teach compassion and generosity to their offspring but fathers who show a child how to face the world.

They’re Guy Things

After all, without fathers, who would be the second person to hold the newborn and declare without the slightest bit of embarrassment, “She really has her mother’s beautiful eyes. But check out this grip! This kid’s a natural athlete!”

Without dads, who’d show you how to whistle using a mere blade of grass or safely whittle with your first pocketknife? Who would read to you until he fell asleep or take you to see your first toddler-inappropriate PG animated movie? Furthermore, who will make a fool of himself filming your stage debut as the living tomato in the preschool Thanksgiving pageant?

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