I don’t think many people believe me when I tell them I talk
to my dad every day, but it’s true. When we’re busy, we usually take a few moments
to check in. When he’s working overnight as a pediatric nurse, he pretty regularly
sends me messages during his downtime. Nothing urgent, just, “Are you still
awake?” or “I see Stella had a friend over today. How did it go?” Days when my
kids are in school and he’s home from work, it’s not unusual for us to talk for
over an hour. We speak so frequently that he sometimes doesn’t even say hello,
just picks up on the conversation where we last left it. “Yeah, so, it turns
out the mulch was on sale so I just bought enough to do the front and the
backyard and it’s humid as hell.” Even 900 miles away, my father is a part of
my everyday life. He’s there, via cell phone, when one of the kids does something
amazing and I have to call and brag. He’s there when one of the kids is giving
me trouble and I need to vent my frustration. He’s there when I’m anxious,
bored, or complaining about my in-laws. He’s there when I desperately need him.
But he’s also there when I don’t need much of anything at all, just calling to
tell me about his day, ask for my opinion, update me on the health of my uncle,
who now lives with my parents, or ask, “So how old does your sister have to be
before she doesn’t have to put my income on her FAFSA?” Sometimes, he just sits
on the phone as I cry. Sometimes, I do the same for him.
It’s
important to mention that things haven’t always been this way. For the first
few years of my life, I wanted absolutely nothing to do with my dad. In fact, in
my first memory, I am standing on the steps of our house in Pittsburgh, leaning
far over the railing to spit on my dad’s head as he paints a wall with my baby
brother sleeping next to him. That will
teach him, I remember thinking. When
Mommy comes home, she’ll take my side (turns out I’ve always been a
manhating feminist). In middle and high school, my father and I used to fight
so often and so loud we probably shook the walls. “I hate you,” I
would shout, truly meaning it, as my dad stalked around in his tighty whities, forbidding
to let me leave the house. “I am out of here, do you here me?! I’m going anywhere
else. Anyone else’s family is better than this one. I’m going to my boyfriend’s
house, where they respect each other and everyone just does what they want!” It
is only recently, as my own older daughter edges closer to thirteen, that I
realize sometimes the best way to show respect for your child is to chase
after her in your underwear, refusing to let her leave the house. Another way
to respect your child is to forgive her when she leaves the house anyway, to refuse to say I told you so when
she comes home devastated. You have to strike a balance. My father didn’t
always get it right, but he tried, and sometimes the trying alone was a herculean task.
One
time my father got it right—the most important time—was when he returned from a
family vacation (one I’d refused to go on because I was twenty and barely
speaking to my family) in 2005, hoping to spend a nice, relaxing day hanging
out with his four kids and working in the yard. Unfortunately for him, that peaceful
day was not to be. Instead, as my mother and I stood in the kitchen, waiting
for his coffee to brew, what he got was this exchange:
Dad: Everything go okay while we were gone?
Me: Yep. How was your trip?
Dad: It was fine, but man, being around all those little kids made me realize I’m happy to wait a long, long time before I become a grandfather.
(At this moment, my mother, with whom I’ve already had a Very Important Conversation, bursts out laughing.)
Me: Well, that’s funny, Dad, because I’m pregnant.
Dad: Ha ha. Very funny.
Me: Dad, I’m not joking.
Mom (attempting to stifle nervous laughter): She’s not joking.
Me: Happy Father’s Day?
Dad: Oh. (an infinite pause) I need to...
(My father walks around the house for a good fifteen minutes with only one shoe on, saying nothing, his hands in his hair. He walks back into the kitchen, still only one shoe.)
Dad:I need to go to Lowe’s to buy a plunger. For the toilet. In the bathroom.
Me: You need to go to Lowe’s right now? To buy a plunger?
Dad: Yes.
(He leaves the kitchen. I assume he finds his other shoe. He goes to the store.)
And that was it. No yelling. No chasing me around the house in his underwear. No long speech where he informed me that I had ruined my life. No accusing me of bringing shame on the family. No tears, at least in front of me. We had a conversation so free of drama I don't even really remember it, and less than a month later, I had moved out of my downtown apartment and was back with my parents, waiting as my uncle and father converted his beloved screened-in back porch to a spare bedroom with a nook to keep a baby's crib and a window to the kitchen where we would eventually pass the baby back and forth between feedings. This feat-- the last-minute, frantic addition of a new bedroom-- is especially astounding when one considers that my father has been planning to build a deck around the swimming pool since I was eleven years old. He's been planning to convert the room back to a porch since that babh, my daughter, was a year old, and she's twelve now. He has been remodeling the kitchen so long my husband and children don't know a time when knives and utensils were kept in a drawer instead of a big Tupperware container on the floor. I share this not to pass judgment, but to illustrate the true miracle of my father committing to and finishing an extension to his house in under a month. What made the new room different from all the other projects, of course, is that it wasn't for him. It was for me. So it had to get done.
Being a father-- especially a good one-- is very often a thankless job. Moms get most of the credit because in general, and this was especially true when I was kid growing up in the eighties and nineties, mothers do most of the hands-on work of raising the kids. When I was growing up, my mom stayed home to take care of us and my dad went to work, much like my own family operates now. And much like my own family (shout-out to my husband, Thom-- Happy Father's Day, honey!), my dad often came home from his first job to start immediately on his second. He worked all day as the Chief of Planning at the Army Corps of Engineers and then came home and painted houses, painted driveways (the nineties were a strange time), cleaned beach houses and cared for his ailing parents, all the while making sure that he only rarely missed a parent-teacher conference, cheerleading competition, concert, school play, poetry reading, or basketball game for his four children. We rarely, if ever, thanked him for that. Why, my siblings and I must have figured, should we thank him for just doing what a father is supposed to do? Dads work all the time and when they're not working, they're spending time with their kids, begging their teenagers to switch from MTV to "regular TV" at 8:00 so they can catch a peaceful hour of their shows in their special spot on the couch before sleeping for a few hours and doing it all again the next day, regularly waking in the middle of the night to a teenage daughter sneaking home way, way after curfew and having to take the time to chase her around in their underwear for an hour or so, responding to to every "I hate you!" with "Oh, no you don't! You're just being a brat!"
Being a father is the kind of job where you know you're doing a good job if everyone in your house is able to take you for granted. Need a parent to be the bad guy at a parent-teacher meeting? Call Dad. Need to make a creepy boyfriend disappear? Call Dad. Need someone to help you with your Algebra homework while you accuse him of "not even doing it the way they taught us so how can you possibly help me!?" Call Dad. Wreck your car? Call Dad. Poke a hole in the pool siding and flood the backyard? Call Dad. Lose your wallet in a foreign country? Call Dad. Break your arm? Call Dad. Run out of money? Call Dad. Need someone to come over and deep clean your house while you recover from a c-section? Call Dad. If you're doing your job right, your kids will never really understand that many kids grow up without a father, or at least a good one, to call. If you're doing your job right, your children and even your grandchildren will grow up knowing your house-- the house you work so hard for-- is a safe space, where trespasses are forgiven and you're always welcome home.
Happy Father's Day, Dad. Talk to you soon.
