ALL THAT FATHERLY

Dear Spike:

I’m sure you will notice, when you look at the dates on these letters, that it has been a good while since last I wrote. I suppose that mostly is because I’ve started sleeping again.

I’m not quite sure when my insomnia went away, although I reckon it had something to do with seeing your tiny heart beating on the ultrasound monitor, two weeks ago. There was, after that moment, simply less to fret about in the quiet moments of the night.

I’ve also grown more comfortable with the general idea of becoming a father. As such, I spend less time awake at night wondering whether I’ll know how to teach you to throw, or to ride a bike, or to play the guitar. Something tells me I will know what I need to know.

After all, I’ve already found myself feeling quite fatherly in thought and deed. And I’m often pleased at the way these thoughts come about.

Last Wednesday, for instance: I was walking to the coffee shop with my good friend, Scott, when we passed a man with a little baby in his arms, walking the opposite direction.

We’ve had a remarkably warm November, but it was nonetheless too cold outside for a baby to be without a hat, as this man’s child was. I muttered something to that effect under my breath, to which Scott — who has a young daughter and another child on the way — chuckled.

“Already thinking like a dad,” he said.

“Yes,” I said, smiling and sharing his laugh. “I suppose I am.”

To be certain, it wasn’t a complicated thought — or, for that matter, all that fatherly. One need not be Bill Cosby to know this. The fact is, you need only be bald, as I am, to know the importance of a warm hat on a cold day.

But in that moment, I rather enjoyed the concern I felt for that little baby. I could imagine myself feeling that way for you. And it felt good.

Yet I have not always felt so proud of my newfound fatherly impulses.

Friday, for instance: I was waiting in line at a fast food restaurant when two young men walked up behind me. They were dressed in the timeworn uniform of the disillusioned — chains dangling from the belt loops of tight black jeans, black T-shirts with cracked white print. Unkempt mohawks. Bad dye jobs. You’ll know the sort.

You might even be the sort, some day.

The shorter of the two — he was perhaps 16 years old — had a deep red welt under his left eye. At first, I thought perhaps he’d been cut in a fight or perhaps had fallen from his skateboard. And then I took a closer look.

My stomach turned. The cut was no accident. That much was very clear.

For it was in the shape of a swastika.

I cannot imagine what would cause a boy, born into the luxuries we enjoy in this country, to want to scar his face with a symbol of such oppression, hate and violence. But at that moment I didn’t care to understand.

All I wanted to do was strike him. Hard. Again and again. To make him feel, if only for a moment, a fraction of a fraction of an infinitely small fraction of the pain and fear meant to be caused by the symbol he wore so smugly on his cheek.

It’s been three days, but I can’t get that boy out of my head. Or rather, I can’t get the way I felt, in that moment, out of my head.

Why had I wanted to hurt him? Anger manifested as a desire for violence might be natural were I Jewish, Polish, gay or Gypsy. But I am not. I have no ancestors who were persecuted under that symbol. Indeed, by three generations, I am too young to even remember that dark period of human history.

So why would I be so angry? So much so that my first impulse would be to strike that young man?

And then, earlier this evening, there it was:

You’ll know the sort. You might even be the sort.

I wanted to hurt him because I wanted to teach him.

This is a fatherly thought as well, albeit one I am ashamed to have had. I would never consciously advocate violence as a means to any end, let alone as a tool for teaching. And yet, there it was. Clear and cruel and brutal.

You will learn much about yourself as you go along, particularly in times in which your life is changing in drastic and rapid ways. Some things you will like and some things you will not. You might, in fact, learn a lot of things about yourself that you do not like. You might even learn some things about yourself that you find loathsome. Do not let that keep you from learning more.

For self-discovery will beget self-understanding. And self-understanding will beget self-control.

And that, my child, will beget a good night’s sleep.

Love,
dad