This weekend is Father’s Day. A confusing day for many of us. It’s not that we don’t love our fathers, or want to honor them, but for many of us…especially men…it’s that we just never knew them. Fathers were shadows who usually only showed their face in a time of crisis or when we needed to be “disciplined”. They were the “bread winners” and we appreciated them for that, but in the end, we longed for and still need so much more from them. I know better now, than to blame them solely for what I call this “shadow effect”. The cards were stacked against them in so many ways. They didn’t really know how to be dads and not just fathers. But the pain of that distance remains for many of us.
One of my earliest memories is when I was about 4 or 5 years old. I’m doing something I rarely did. I am sitting on my father’s lap, and he is singing a nursery rhyme. One I have passed on to my children and grandchildren: “There was a little pony his name was dapple gray…” (I’d share the rest of this nursery rhyme, but the rest of the words were so horrific I had to change them for Emerson, my granddaughter). Look, I’m super happy in this mental image. I mean I was sitting on my father’s lap. It was one of those rare moments when my father let down his guard enough to be transformed into DAD! But as I recall this memory there’s also something else there. Another emotion that seems strange to have been there: fear.
Now look. This fear wasn’t there because my dad was abusive. My dad was one of the kindest men I know. He had a heart for compassion that was wider than the oceans. So why the fear? Well, I think it had to do with the fact that my dad was incredibly absent, either physically or emotionally, for much of my life. He was out showing compassion to the world so much that when he got home, he just didn’t have much left. And so home was a place where Dad slipped into his bedroom and rested, while we all tried to be quiet. And that wasn’t easy for the eight of us. Vacations weren’t bonding times but burnt-out respites.
When I think of my father, I am always amazed at the power and energy and mystery that my father’s presence brought into our family, and included in that presence and energy and mystery was an element of what I can only describe as fear. Along with that fear, for me at least, was an insatiable longing to break through all that “father” stuff to get to actually being with my “dad”. The dad out there that everyone else knew and loved. That dad whose lap the child in me still longs for.
I often wonder if that connection point would have happened if my dad hadn’t died at 60. I often fantasize about me and my dad fishing in a boat somewhere or walking the Pacific Crest Trail together. He in his “Tandy Leather Co.” moccasins, and both of us holding hand carved walking sticks. And on that trail or on that boat, in my dreams anyway, all that strange fear and distance evaporates. All the barriers between us melt away and we walk the way I think our good God intended us to be dad (not father) and son as one, in an intimate embrace. Talking not about our jobs and sports and the weather, but about our relationships and joys and fears. Who knows we may even get to the real stuff on that walk. Who knows his hand might even reach across the abyss and hold mine. Who knows, maybe even amid that walk we will stop laughing and even share about the loss of his daughter and my sister. Something we never ever broached.
Some advice to all you fathers out there. Stop being just fathers and learn to be dads. Stop always expecting. Stop just praising your sons and daughters when they are successful. That’s just not enough. Stop thinking you have to be something this society thinks you need to be, and just be Dad. Just be a lap to sit on. Just play catch without being coach, too. Just go to a ballgame or a concert without outcome as the only goal. Ballgames were not invented to win, they were given to us so we could connect, embrace, and explore what it means to live. Don’t ruin it with outcome-based assessments! Learn to be…just dad. Learn to begin every encounter you have with your child not with “ought to’s” and “here’s what you can do betters”, but simply with kindness. Bend before you preach. And never ever hold back a laugh or a tear.
Don’t go through life wishing you were a better father…just be dad! Don’t go through life holding out just to be there for the “proud moments”. Be there for it all. The world will be a much better place and you won’t have to be alone. Drop all those expectations and run with all your heart to the children and grandchildren God has given you. And maybe just maybe, what you will find there isn’t only family, but something even deeper: God, the sacred, true meaning, love. If you don’t believe me, try reading the story of the prodigal son in Luke 15.
Your friend and pastor, learning to drop the legacy of my father’s clothing to embrace my God given dad-ness, Brook