Father's Day...

I suppose my first notion of the concept of Fatherhood occurred about when I was 4 years old.  My older brother Dave wasn't feeling well and my Dad got signed up to take both Dave and me to the doctor.  Being that dad was a salesman, he was always dressed very professionally for work; impeccable suit, tie, shoes polished - the works.

Whatever illness we had at that time, I remember that both Dave and I got shots for it.  And Dave started to feel a little queasy in the aftermath of the shot.  The color drained from his face, he crossed his arms over his stomach and said "Dad, I don't feel so good..."

My dad turned his attention from me, I was still sobbing from the shot, and he looked back at Dave.  I suppose it was the sound of that first hard gag that got his attention. I remember him crossing the room in a flash while at the same time searching for any kind of vessel to catch what was inevitably coming next.  It was almost like something out of a cartoon or maybe a Dick Van Dyke movie.  He danced around the examination room in fast motion - moving from counter to counter searching for a wastebasket, barf bag, lunch box - anything I suppose - and eventually wound up in front of Dave with his empty hands outstretched the same way a punter appears just before he drops the ball to kick it.

"BBBB.....BBBBBB.....BBBBB...BAAAAAARRRRFFFFFFF!" is what Dave said.

Dad's hands weren't empty after that.  In his later years, when we were grown and he was more confident in sharing with his children some of the saltier passages from his time in the service, he described that moment to me this way "I stood there, covered in barf, feeling like I had been shot at and missed and shit at and hit..."

The point of the whole story is, I remember at the moment it happened, thinking "Well, if that's what it is to be a dad, then I don't ever want to be a dad."

Well, I have been a dad now 11 years.  And in those 11 years I have been barfed on, peed & pooped on, had every shirt I own treated as a hankie for a kid crying from hurt feelings, skinned knees, or missing toys.  I survived 1000 or more shots to the grapes from the murderously cute and fast moving hands, knees, elbows, and feet of my two kids.  I have driven 75 miles round trip to a rest area in the middle of the night to search a rest area garbage can for a lost iPod Touch...let me just let that sink in for you...a rest area garbage can.  If anything on Earth can be more accurately described as Hell's anus than a rest area garbage can I don't know what it is; but I searched it for a missing iPod Touch that was a gift from Santa.  I mopped up Barf at Sam's Club - and I have never worked at Sam's Club.

I can confidently say that if those were the only things listed on the Dad job description, I would have never applied.  As it turns out though, the creepier, more disgusting aspects of fatherhood really kind of fall down to the level of "other duties as assigned" on the "Dad Job Description."

I have also cheered like a madman at baseball games and, lately road races.  I cried at scouting events and pre-school graduations, read stories and had them read back to me in hilarious fashion and have been party to a million inside jokes. I've had to stop the car two houses down, already late for work, because a pee-wee in pigtails and a sundress is chasing me down the street crying because I did not give her sufficient hugs and kisses before I left the door.  At work, I wear a lanyard carrying my work ID that proclaims I am "The World's Greatest Dad" because one Christmas when my son was 8, he apparently thought that.  I watched both of these children come into the world - have known them literally since the time they were "1 second old."  I have been told I love you 95,000 times more than I ever expected to hear that phrase in my life.


In short, I have been changed in ways I could not imagine. And  - despite the vibrant disagreement I am having with an 11 year old boy over what are reasonable expectations for a snoozy Sunday morning at the precise moment I am writing this  - I can say with certainty and confidence that I am still the luckiest guy I know.

So this Father's Day, I hope all those great dads out there stay dry and free from any type of human emissions. From this SmallTownDad to all the other dads out there, have a great Father's Day.

Dennis
smalltowndad@hotmail.com

P.S.  Any dads out there reading this already know the inevitable outcome of the missing iPod Touch.  The device that everyone was certain had inadvertently found its way into a McDonald's bag on the way home from some trip and was then discarded in the Rest Area garbage can?  Yeah, it was under the back seat of the car.  I only discovered it there AFTER I searched the garbage can.   But, I am a dad - and that still rocks.

As it turns out, I have Kryptonite...

It's true.  As it turns out, I have my own Kryptonite.  And, discovering that this past weekend, I confess no small degree of surprise that it’s not cheesecake, BBQ ribs, foxy boxing or war movies that will prove my undoing.

No, my Kryptonite, of all stupid and improbable things, is a song.  And to make it worse, it’s a song from a Disney movie!  I can sense you shaking your heads.  I know.  Imagine things from my point of view – you are just now learning this about me.  I AM me and am just now learning this about me.

The circumstances of this discovery are run of the mill, "small town dad" kinds of things.  I was at my daughter’s pre-school graduation last Friday.  Yes, we are a small town, and yes, we do pre-school graduation – and try as I might to sneer my cool sneer at this idea of a graduation pre-dating the time that this little kid actually even starts school; I can not.

The teachers have been with them two years (in some case almost half of the little kids’ lives). The kids themselves and the parents have traveled this road together.  The parents can walk confidently from the parking lot without crying or looking back and their little ones have gone from terrified toddlers unable to let go of mom or dad’s pant leg in the morning, to budding independents with confidence, intellect, and unvarnished personality in full bloom.  These thoughts already on my mind last Friday, I confess, I was feeling less than bulletproof when I got there.

The ceremony itself was in a beautiful old fashioned school auditorium.  A gift to the community 80 some odd years ago from auto millionaire James Couzens after a madman destroyed the community school and killed scores of people.  Upon learning of the disaster, Couzens called the Governor and said “Mr. Governor, my fortune is at your disposal.  Rebuild the school.”

Rebuild it they did. The lobby of the auditorium is almost sacred in its reverence to the little town and its school kids who survived the tragedy.  It is hallowed ground already. Evidence of so much vitality; so much life having passed through its halls in unheralded fashion, is everywhere.  Ancient school desks on display; the school clock saved from the bombed out ruins, composite pictures of every graduating class dating back to pre-World War II remind all who pass that time is always special; and always moving, never guaranteed but for the precise moment you are living.

So it was that I walked briskly through this sepia toned slice of my new hometown to take in what was to be the most modest of ceremonies – my little girl, the miracle child who almost never was, graduating from pre-school.

As I made my way into the auditorium, I heard “the song.”  Now, I don’t pretend to know everyone reading these pages, but I know enough of you to know that almost of all of you who are parents have a song that is “the song” that reminds you of your kids. 

The song I heard entering the auditorium was Phil Collins’ “You’ll be in my heart” from the Disney movie, Tarzan.  Immediately my knees buckled, I could not breathe, and either allergies or the gnats from a thousand camels attacked my eyes because for some reason I could not see out of them and they started leaking this kind of clear, viscous fluid.  I had to sit down.

That song, as it turns out, is “the song” for my son, our oldest.  He was born on a summer night at very nearly midnight.  Like it is for all new parents, the experience of bringing our first child into this world was an adventure of conquering the unexpected and walking through the fear.  When he was born we were at the hospital for over 13 hours and had one minor emergency that scared me to death.  Around 4:00 am, when all went quiet and my wife and new son were tucked in and safe and sound – I walked out to the car for a short ride home to catch some sleep before coming back to the hospital the next morning.

Our modest home was about 5 miles away and the roads were deserted.  I started the car and turned on the radio just in time to hear “You’ll be in my heart.”  It’s a song I'll forever associate with him and my journey from plain old Dennis to SmallTownDad.

Listening to the lyrics that day, reflecting on the events and permanent change they brought to my life, I realized then how, all at once, I had a new singular purpose in my life – to keep this family safe.  By the time I got home that night 11 years ago I was so full of passion and adrenaline I would have gladly gone looking for lions, tigers, or any other perceived threat to my family.  I felt inspired and committed to the idea that no matter what in my life, as a dad I would always have to be brave.

So it was that the same song that inspired me 11 years previously sapped my strength last Friday.  I sat immobile; every ounce of testosterone repelled from my body with the force of two magnets of the same polarity. In that moment I came to another realization.  The bravery stuff is obvious – all animals have it when it comes to their children.  It’s how we guarantee the survival of the species.

But, zoology and evolution aside, I realized then that nothing in my life prepared me for how much I would love these children; how vulnerable I would be to even their most humble achievements or modest heartaches.  Nothing prepared me for the reckoning that with each celebration marked, each milestone achieved – there comes a collateral moment of the rare and beautiful gift of this special time slipping away into my life’s rearview mirror.

So today’s blog is a blog about celebration and appreciation.  I am so grateful to have been blessed with this chance to be a dad; to watch them grow and to know their stories – to have these small hands to hold if even for a little bit.  The legacy of this little town we chose is to not take one moment for granted; don’t forsake any of the badges or incidences of childhood.  Through natural means or other, those will be gone into memory soon enough.

Thanks for stopping by today – I hope wherever you are this graduation season –if you are celebrating a college, high school, or pre-school graduation – you seize that moment to cry hot tears, cheer ‘til your throat is sore, and reflect on the cascading series of miracles that put you and yours at exactly this place with exactly these people.

Dennis

smalltowndad@hotmail.com