Knowing who you are: "Daddy"...

When I’m home by myself, I don’t know what to do with myself. I literally wander from room to room, looking for God knows what... Well, I actually know what--I’m looking for someone to take care of.

I enter the kitchen, but there’s no one to cook for. I grab a banana.

The bathroom: no one to wipe, dipe, or bathe.

Bedrooms are empty, with no one to clothe or cuddle.

I move to the livingroom and sit down on the couch for a moment. My fingers pause their channel-changing when PBS kids flashes on, and again at Qubo. There is nothing interesting on T.V. for my age group. I turn off the T.V. and do a slow-fall to the left, drawing a pillow under my head and I sleep. I sleep and sleep and sleep, and then I move upstairs to sleep some more. I sleep until my purpose returns, sowing a cloud of dust up the driveway, swinging down and out of sliding doors, and bursting through the front door like a whirlwind. A whirlwind of smiles, and laughter, and cries, and duties, and jobs, and spankings, and hugs and kisses, and responsibility.




“Father Bear”

Let’s start with the bad:

I’m not always a nice dad.

Sometimes I’m the sleeping bear

With the bright red hair,

The opposable thumbs,

And lungs that thrum

To tell the house (and all in it)

That naps on—AND IT’S TIME TO BEGIN IT!

Mostly I’m good:

In the morning I wake

My children with care,

No longer the grumbling, mumbling bear.

Sometimes I’m a puppy

Gently snuffling

At my babies’ necks

While getting them dressed.

Singing a song,

Neverendingly-long,

That tells them I love them

And they’ll always belong—

Even when I’m the bear

With the bright red hair

Roaring and growling,

Baring teeth and howling

About how he’s missed his nap.