Happy Fathers’ Day

I find Fathers’ Day something of a strange cultural tradition, in part because I don’t celebrate Fathers’ Day with my father. While we’ve repaired much of our relationship over the years we’ll never really be that kind of father and daughter again. But we’re doing ok. He lives overseas and the absence of celebration isn’t particularly awkward for us. I do enjoy celebrating fatherhood with my partner though. He got a little sleep-in and the requisite underwear gifts from our children. We went out for sushi and ran into friends of ours who can still pass for cool, young things and they said we didn’t know you still came into the city anymore and we said we don’t. They held Cormac and exchanged meaningful looks. Like a girl couple with babies on their mind. Not long after that Lauca had a screaming melt down on the street and Cormac was a quiet little bee and I thought every age is going to be a more difficult age with that older one. In the evening we went for dinner at my partner’s parents’ house and his father held Cormac. Look who I’ve got, he said proudly. I noticed our nephew gave his Fathers’ Day present to him and that he accepted it graciously; such is required of a grandfather, I guess, when that little one is stuck with an absent and thoroughly useless father.

For those who are doing fatherhood so thoughtfully, my best wishes. For those who aren’t, you may be responsible for the inordinate number of drunken men I saw on the streets today. I mean it was midday for godsake. I wondered, were these the men haunted by their failings as fathers or were they the other ones, the grown sons, still so sad about their fathers messing up?

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