Happy father's Day

To the men who became fathers...

Art credit: pixelsmerch

This Father’s Day I am thinking quite a bit about my father, and the lessons I have gleaned from him. And especially now that I too am thinking about becoming a father. It is time, someone’s daughter told me. I think she fears I may end up finishing all the engineers, climate activists and doctors and just be left with brokers, forex traders, and DJs. Does the world really need more DJs? 

We don’t talk much with my father. Not out of spite. It’s just who we are, shy men. I pretend not to be seen. He pretends not to see me. My father is getting old now. He has white hair. When I call him I think that just the other day, he was a young man at the apogee of his youth. Now his hospital visits have become frequent, his runway much shorter, his eyesight failing, which is not such a bad thing when I eventually bring a baddie home he won’t approve. “You don’t see her like I do,” will be my line.

I've been considering and worrying about fatherhood, about how you do it, how he did it. When I go through our photo album—yes, we still have photo albums—I see him stood there, with his half a dozen or so kids. A fun guy who knows what time it is and smells nice. A responsible man. Okay, maybe not—he got my younger brother 13 years after me. Argh! Spacing people! Spacing!

Fatherhood is not cool. But is important. It’s work. Because of the commitment and the obligation and the worry. It’s the society’s thyroid gland. It’s that thing whose presence is made much larger by its absence, it’s our whole country, which you never think of until it’s gone, which you never love until you’re no longer there. It’s not like winning the Premier league unbeaten. Or peeing in a straight line, uninterrupted. 

When you are young, your father is your hero. Childhood’s greatest pleasure might be the illusion that our parents have some idea what they’re doing. But life’s needles and thorns prick you as a reminder that, of course, no one does. Parents fight, they quit their jobs, they move to the village, they take jobs they don’t like, they get another child 13 years after they had you. In other words, they are human.

But I am thankful that my father if he did not give us wings, at least did not cage us. It was fine to be what you wanted. As long as it’s not a DJ. What do we owe our parents? Do we owe them more than what they gave us? If we’ve given them a thousand chances to be better for us, do we give them one more? It’s not all global kumbaya and moments of shared humanity, of course. A core memory I have of him is when he gently exchanged words after someone had disrespected him. And by words, I mean blows. And by gently, I mean he beat them up. Go dad. He taught me that you cannot negotiate for your humanity, that sometimes you gotta fight when you are a man.

My father will never make prime time news, unless he becomes a DJ in Roysambu. He lives in the shadows, the working class who makes this woebegone nation work. He institutionalized his outsiderdom. He will never be recognized for making such a fine handsome son (me) although he should. He will, hopefully, not become a politician with friends who can “hire” him a jet. He won’t make headlines for breaking out, or breaking in. His story gets lost in the mire of absent fathers, because that is what sells. I compare him to Enoch, a humble man whose story is barely captured in the scriptures. We learn simply in Genesis 5:22 and 5:24 that “Enoch walked with God.”

So, like most among us, he remains unseen. He loves his wife. He showed up for his family. He set an example. He does his part in making sure this country does not produce more DJs. And he is present. He is a walking sermon. Maybe this is your father, too. Just an ordinary man. A few good men. But that’s okay. Because Enoch was an ordinary man too. But he had an extraordinary epitaph. Happy Father’s Day to all the men here. Because even if you are not a father, you’re still a son.

As told By Eddy Ashioya Eddy Ashioya

#chinedutales  #HappyFathersDay