Fatherhood Ain't Easy

My father, Arnold, my son, Travis, and I at a Dayton Dragons game in 2014.

I’m a lucky guy. I had a father who worked hard, kept food on the table, a roof over our heads, and didn’t run off with a cocktail waitress. Dad chose to stick around and ended up living to be 94. He didn’t do anything half-assed.

It wasn’t always sunshine and rainbows. I grew up in the late 60s and 70s, and most issues with my dad revolved around alcohol, mood swings, heated arguments, and cocktail waitresses. If you’ve ever watched the TV show Mad Men, then you remember the main character, Don Draper, and the kinds of things he did. Well, that was my dad. I think they even wore the same suits.

Dad wasn’t the only one who chose to stick around. So did Mom. And she did so because of me, I’m sure of it. I’ve carried that guilt around with me for quite a while.

So, I try to remember the good times. Vacations, baseball games, holiday cookouts, dad coming home late from work, and passing out drunk on the bathroom floor. Wait, that was me. Hey, at least I made it to the bathroom. Dad usually opened the front door, fell in, and was out for the night.

As I recall, my coming home and passing out on the bathroom floor is what led me to leave the nest and join the Army. They didn’t mind if I passed out on the bathroom floor, as long as I cleaned up afterwards. Good times.

Flash forward a few years, and I get married and become a father myself. Two sons, fifteen months apart. I didn’t know how to be a father. I mean, I didn’t exactly have the best teacher. I remember when I was in the fourth grade and heard some of the kids at school use the word “virgin” as if they knew what it meant.

We always had dogs when I was a kid. Beagles, to be exact. One year, one of our dogs had a litter of puppies, and I was helping Dad clean out their kennel. Mom was in the house, so I figured I’d seek out some sage advice from dear old dad.

“Dad, what does virgin mean?”

Long pause.

“Dad?”

“Well...” Dad clears his throat. “You see those puppies there?”

“Yeah.”

“They’re virgins.”

“Oh.”

End of conversation, and I walked away very confused.

Now that I’m much older, and I’d like to think much wiser, I’ve realized that my dad’s issues and shortcomings as a father and/or husband were directly related to some kind of trauma he experienced growing up dirt-poor in the hills of West Virginia during the Great Depression. More than likely, it was something he went through while serving in WWII.

It's worth mentioning here that my father was vehemently against me joining the Army. He talked about his time in the military very rarely, but when he did, it always seemed like he was holding something back.

I may not have been taught what to do as a father (except pushing them to play sports and nagging them to get jobs), but I knew what not to do. The main thing, if your kids have a dream, support it, no matter how lofty or out of reach it may seem.

I had lots of dreams that were met with words like “No.” “That’s crazy.” “Why do you want to do that?” Maybe that’s why I became a writer. If I couldn’t do it, then I’d write about it.

But I digress. On-the-job fatherhood training was my life. One day, the wife decided to go visit her mother (probably to complain about me) and leave me with the boys. Sure, I can handle it. The oldest was almost two-and-a-half, and the youngest was like eight months. I hadn’t endangered their lives or let them starve. Yet, anyway.

Just so you know, I’ll be referring to my sons as “The oldest” and “The youngest,” because calling them “Number one” and “Number two” would be disrespectful. Especially number two.

I was feeding the youngest on the couch when I heard a noise coming from the kitchen that sounded like a two-year-old doing something he shouldn’t be doing. I got up and walked in, still holding my youngest, to see the oldest standing on the kitchen table. I sprang into action and laid the youngest on the couch. He’ll be fine, I told myself.

I ran into the kitchen to grab the oldest and save him from a terrible fall. He began to cry because he very much wanted to be standing on that kitchen table. I ran back to the couch in time to see the youngest roll off and hit the floor, perfectly on his back, like a baby gymnast. The drop was about 18 inches to the carpet. I wasn’t fast enough to prevent that fall.

The look on the youngest’s face was one of confusion. At first. Then, it changed to extreme horror after he realized the 18-inch fall didn’t feel good, and his father, who left him all alone on the couch, was responsible. He began to cry, much like the oldest.

The wife finally came home to find all three of us sitting on the couch, crying.

Flash forward again to junior high, in the mid to late 90s. Enter interpersonal relationship conundrums and girls, spurring phone calls to the house from school, bus drivers, and girls’ dads. Those were the best.

“He did what? He said what? Are you sure it was him? Yeah, that’s him. I’ll handle it. I said, I’d handle it. Look, man, there’s no need to involve the police.” Good times.

There are many more memorable events from my education as a father that I could go into. I’m sure the statute of limitations has run out on most of them, but I’ll save those for another post. The point I’m trying to make here is... Fatherhood ain't easy, whether you know what you’re doing or not.

In all seriousness, the best memories are watching your kids succeed. Having grace under pressure when they’re faced with adult problems, or finding something they are truly passionate about, and giving it their all. Or, watching them become a better father than you could ever be.

Maybe I didn’t know what I was doing, but I think I did okay.

Good times.