I know, I know, I'm a little late, but I figure that late is better than never. Yesterday, we all celebrated our fathers, the men in our lives that have such a strong influence over us (whether we care to admit it or not).
Father's Day has always seemed like a funny day to me, especially in comparison to Mother's Day. On that day, mothers generally want their children and husbands to finally show their appreciation for the thousands (maybe even millions) of little things they do for us throughout the year. Fathers, on the other hand, seem to just want to be left alone. Unless it involves someone bringing them an ice cold beverage or a delicious snack, they're more than content to just get some time to themselves, time when they are free from the nagging and whining of their family members. Or maybe that's just my dad. I'm pretty sure his ideal Father's Day would be getting in 18 holes (with some breaks for a few frosty brews) and being able to buy whatever he wanted, whether it was a membership to a gourmet coffee club, a $150 pool chair, or state-of-the-art spatula that can do more things to meat on a grill than you could ever even wrap your head around.
That's a little off-topic, but it's just a funny little thing I noticed.
Anyway, now it's the REAL part of the blog, where I get to pay tribute to my dad. Not that I really need to- all you'd have to do is search around our house. You'd find the countless gifts from graduating track stars, pillows with iron-on pictures, scrapbooks individualized by runners and jumpers, newspaper articles about his success as a coach. Until pretty recently, I never really thought about the impact my dad has had on other people. Once I figured that out, I realized how much his strong community influence had an effect on me, no matter how indirectly.
In some ways, my dad and I have had trouble really "getting" each other. I was always the daughter that wanted to read and write, the one that hated running and loved eating. I was the one that did anything I could to try to get away from our family stereotype that I found stifling- that you were an athlete no matter how hard you tried not to be.
When I think back to when I was younger, especially in middle school, I imagine that my father struggled to understand me, just as I struggled to understand him. It worsened when I got to high school and went through a phase which can be referred to in two ways. The nice way is the "growing up" phase. The accurate way is the bitch phase. All I wanted was to prove him wrong- that athletics didn't matter, that they brought nothing deeper or important into your life. He just sat back and said nothing, e-mailing college volleyball coaches when I wasn't looking and talking to admissions offices about the college's sports.
He did his convincing subtly. At the time, I would have never been able to tell you when he was asserting his arguments for the merits of sport. To me, it was just a conversation with my dad. But over the years, through all the phone calls and e-mails and text messages, he somehow got through. Somehow, I became an advocate of what I used to condemn. I became a believer in the power of teamwork and commitment required by athletics. It inspired me to join Teach For America and his story, his experience took up roughly 95% of my letter of intent. That's a pretty impressive influence to have over someone. He had finally converted me and I'll never go back.
As my sister has put it before, my parents are "the coolest 50-year-olds she's ever met." In high school, I would have vehemently disagreed with that statement. My parents could not be farther from cool. But after the years of arguments and getting in trouble, I've finally seen the role models that so many other kids saw before me. In my mother, it was obvious. She wears her feelings and opinions on her sleeve and lets you know what she thinks immediately.
My dad, and I think dads in general, are trickier. They exercise their influence over the years with carefully crafted mottos and mantras, painstakingly inserted during the moments their children are questioning themselves and the world that they know. They continue to do so until one day, we wake up with clear eyes, a clear head, and one clear thought-
"My dad is awesome."
Happy Father's Day!
