What It Really Means to Be a Father

Being a father is its own special state of being

Being a father is when you can't remember the last time you got a full night's sleep, but you can tell "crying because I fell down" from "crying because the juice was in the wrong cup" with a single glance.

When you've become an expert on strollers, thermometers, cartoons, and toddler meltdowns,
even though what you actually wanted was to be a rock star. Or at least sleep until nine.

I have four of them. Yes, by choice. No, I'm not crazy. Well — not entirely.

Every day you learn all over again

And every day I discover something new about myself.
Like the fact that I can read the same book out loud twelve times in a row.

Or that I can resist the urge to strangle someone who, at 5:40 in the morning, asks: "But what if a zebra had a cucumber for a tail?.."

Or that I can love someone so hard it's dizzying, and still dream of just sitting alone in my forest den for fifteen minutes.

Real fatherhood means being there

A father isn't "well done," isn't "the breadwinner," isn't "the head of the household."
He's just the one who's there. Every day. Sometimes in slippers. Sometimes at the end of his rope.
But there.

Congratulations to everyone who's holding it together.
Who hasn't run off. Who doesn't turn fatherhood into a performance.
Even if some days it feels like everything's held together with duct tape and coffee.

Happy Father's Day!