This last year was a bolt of lightning with an endless flicker. It flew right by, but lingered all the way.

We’ve changed a lot. Can’t help it. The planet orbits and we evolve, inevitable as inhale and exhale.

Two weekends ago we had the annual Valentine’s Ball at our school, the same Father Daughter Dance I wrote about last year.

Mia and I had attended the two previous years together because Max had not yet started Kindergarten and tickets were limited. We didn’t want to take another child’s ticket.

This year, Max is in Kinder so it was our first time as a family. The children were a fountain of energy from first light to early star, sweet and happy all day long.

The four of us counted the many minutes until we could finally put on our fancy clothes and drive to the school.

Like last year, my daughter squeezed my hand, looked up at me adoringly in her poofy dress and blushing cheeks, and said with her eyes, “You are the most wonderful thing in the world, Daddy. I love you with all my heart and spending time with you is the bestest thing I could ever imagine.”

Then we entered the cafeteria and I became the invisible man.

Well that’s not true. Invisible men don’t get impatient glances and tapping feet.

Mia’s eight, so I’m totally used to the scriggles (screamy girly giggles) every time she sees her friends, just not when we’re wearing shiny shoes. From the second we entered the cafeteria ballroom, a series of scriggling second graders commanded all our daughter’s attention.

Mia looked over, around and through me to make eye contact with her friends, but never at me. She was off as soon as the music started. Eventually I headed out to the dance floor to look for my first born. I found her two songs in and asked her for a dance.

“No dice dad!”

Is what she might have said if she had taken the time to stop and say something intelligible on her scriggly whiz by.

That’s fine, I thought. No biggie.

Another four or five songs passed before the DJ hopped on the mic and invited all the dads and daughters to the dance floor for the father daughter dance.

I smiled. It was just what I’d been waiting for. I went out to the dance floor to find Mia, but she was nowhere to be found.

I found her a song and a half later. She’d been on a sequin safari with one of her friends, gathering the glittering hearts from abandoned tables and collecting them in an empty cup. She ran up to me with a foot long grin and a scriggle bubbling from her lips. “Look at all the hearts we found!”

“Dance with me,” I said, taking her hand.

“Okay.” I might’ve asked if she wanted seconds on vegetables.

We headed to the dance floor where we started to sway back and forth for all of six seconds before she was looking over, around and through me to see what her friends were doing.

I’m no fool. I know my daughter will grow up and away from me and I don’t want to keep her tiny forever, nor do I think she did anything abnormal or wanted to hurt my feelings in any way.

But I’m human, and find it impossible to ignore the incessant marching of time and all the evidence he leaves carelessly behind. Last year I was the only thing in the room that mattered. This year I wasn’t.

Seasons change and leaves fall from the tree only to flourish on the same branches the following year. I know we’ve done well to nurture our children’s soil and that growing pains aren’t only for the little ones.

I feel fortunate to know in my heart that though Mia will one day outgrow my lap, she will never outgrow me.

Despite my best intentions, it is entirely possible this video is funny only to me and those people who know my son. However, I’m willing to take the risk. The video is only a minute forty seconds and I sorta dare you not to smile a single time.

Here’s Max, dancing to Billie Jean.

Enjoy!

“Life is a process of becoming, a combination of states we have to go through. Where people fail is that they wish to elect a state and remain in it. This is a kind of death.”
~Anais Nin

My daughter writes a post every Thursday over at Children Write the Future, and though she does love to write, she doesn’t necessarily experience the same pleasure at the prospect of sitting in one spot and sanding her work to a smooth finish. The other day she claimed that she was quite certain that I never have to edit my work. I assured her that although some things I write receive only an edit or two, everything gets at least that. And my best work, I told her, is often looked over  5-10 times, sometimes over a period of weeks or months.

I had her sit beside me yesterday while I edited a post. We read the rough draft together, filled as it was with clunky sentences and awkward phrasing. I slowly went through the document, deleting words, adding color and fleshing out my ideas. I explained the reasoning behind each change. What would have taken half an hour was swallowed by the whole, yet I believe it was sixty minutes wonderfully spent. Mia got it, and when we went back to edit her post, it was with a noticeable difference in her attitude. She realized that good enough wasn’t and immediately thought of several ways she could make her work better.

I was grateful for the experience and glad she’d questioned the value of an edit. Just as I often learn a bit more about myself when I write, I also discover more about my thought process when I am teaching my children. Our discussion about the value of editing upstairs and in front of the computer evolved to a deeper discussion downstairs during dinner just one hour later.

“Everything in life can be thought of as an edit,” I said, half surprised as the words left my mouth.

Mia looked at me with the exact expression she’d used when I told her the chicken was really pterodactyl. “Everything?” she repeated.

“Well, maybe not everything,” I said, “but most things in life could be seen that way.”

“Like what?”

The way we live our lives,” I said. “Mommy and I edit our relationship so it gets better each day. You edit your outfits before you leave for school. Max edits which toys he wants to play with and the jokes he wants to tell. Anytime we’re interested in making something the best it can be, we must be willing to edit. Your mother and I are largely responsible for who you and your brother will one day become, and we must do our best to edit you both each day.”

The conversation continued to flow and Mia’s smile continued to widen. The new understanding which brightened her eyes also warmed something inside me; the finish on some of my life’s best work now that much smoother.

I’m not going to lie, sometimes I hate to edit. Though I love shaping things and making them better, there are times when the process is no doubt a chore. I understand Mia’s disinterest in the process and don’t really blame her, though I also know it’s my job to teach her a better way. I would never expect her to edit her raw ideas or go through her journal making X’s and scratches, but if she is going to publish something for others to read while expecting them to spend their valuable minutes, then she should absolutely be delivering her best work.

The same is true with life. Not everything requires a red pen, but we should know which things in our lives are in need of our attention, then take the time needed to trim the fat, solidify our ideas or give clarity to our purpose. Until we stop breathing our life is in draft, but every day we’ve another chance to improve the finish of the final copy.

Writer Dad

After three weeks of rehearsals, last Friday I finally sat to watch the fall talent show at our children’s school. Max didn’t participate, though I think he regretted his decision about five minutes after the first auditions were finished. He didn’t realize he’d have to spend every minute at the rehearsals anyway, but without the benefit of stage time. And believe me, that boy does love a good turn beneath the spotlight.

Mia decided to play her violin, choosing a medley of Twinkle Twinkle Little Star and Lightly Row. What I dearly loved about her performance was the perseverance she showed throughout the piece.

She knows the music well, can play it without pause, and did just fine through all her rehearsals and at-home practice. However, standing on stage and playing in front of a live audience is a different thing entirely then playing from the comfort of your living room, or at rehearsals among friends.

During the transition between Twinkle and the second part of the medley, she starts to lose it. A few seconds later and things really start to break. For me, this is where it gets good.

Mia took a deep breath and found her way through, which is not an easy thing to do when standing in front of a sea of held breath and flashing lights. Even more than the pride I felt watching her on stage, I loved the conclusion of the show when the winners were announced. Of course Mia was hoping to win first prize in the musician category, but she didn’t. That honor went to an adorable kindergartner who played through her own medley of songs on the xylophone, without a single slip.

Mia looked so genuinely happy for the little girl, it made me want to cry. Then I almost did when I saw her approach the tiny tot and give her a giant hug and heartfelt congratulations.

Later, her brother asked her if she was sad that she didn’t win. “No,” Mia said in her matter-of-fact way. “I made mistakes and the winner didn’t.”

Sometimes life is all about preparing for next time. I love that at seven years old, this is something our daughter already understands.

Enjoy!

Writer Dad

Today’s Deja Vuesday/old favorite takes us back to one year ago when some punk ass kid was outside my house uglifiying my corner more than it already was. In the year that’s passed, the neighborhood has continued its decay of comfortable apathy. It’s sad really; what could be one of the more romantic rows of our beautiful city, lined with vintage houses and hard working families has been mostly left to fester and rot.

Hopefully the sun will shine brighter on this zip code on some once upon a someday.

Enjoy!

“Cindy, I need you!” I’m out the door before she can answer, feet over the fence three seconds later.

“Hey!” I yell.

I stop in front of both of them, but grab the bigger one by the shirt as he’s walking away. He’s holding a fist full of labels swiped from the post office. A kindergartner’s logic paints his paws as red as the stop sign he just slapped a label on.

He shrugs me off and starts to walk off, his friend a beat behind. I grab his shirt, pull him toward me, then sidestep in front. “You’re going to clean that off, or you’re gonna wait with me until the cops get here.”

He stares.

I stare back.

The vandal’s a big kid, not used to being challenged. He’s somewhere between fifteen and seventeen, about six foot two. Maybe two-hundred and fifty pounds. He’s got about seventy-five pounds on me, but I’ve the advantage of an inch, and I press it on him like it’s the peak of a mountain.

“Two choices.”

He shrugs me off and gives me his shoulder, but I maneuver back in front. Silent, I produce my phone and hit the number for police, non emergency, our neighborhood enough decayed that the number is immediately accessible.

“Fine,” he says, walking toward the stop sign, “but it don’t come off.”

“It will come off.  The last time I scraped one of those stickers, it took me about half an hour. Though I’m probably faster than you.”

He stares, hate boiling.  ”I don’t have to do this,” he says.

“Then don’t.”

He stands on tip toe, and peels the sticker from the sign. When it’s gone, he scrapes the what’s left with the scraps of his nails. Every peer is peering, countless eyes are peeking from windows, trees, and alleys.

I stand on my corner, arms folded, watching him work, enjoying it far more than when I’m the one scraping. It took three years to get the four way stop sign put on our corner, and all of two days to get it tagged.

“I bet you wouldn’t have done that if your mama was watching,” I say.

“I just did it while my grandma was watching,” he boasts. There is genuine pride in his face, though it is clearly masking a different emotion.

“I hope she’s watching right now.”

The stop sign is shining and he turns to leave. “Don’t forget the trash can,” I said pointing to the can on the corner.

The small trash can came from the city. We first petitioned and then waited two years for its delivery. The trash can is our responsibility. We wipe it down and dump it every Friday. Yes, it is a filthy job, but still preferable to the era when we didn’t have the can and people used our yard, sidewalk and hedges instead. Since we’ve had the can, it’s suffered graffiti, frequent beatings with a baseball bat and intermittent detonations from fireworks stockpiled during the Fourth of July weekend. At the moment, I’m looking at a postal sticker splayed across the side. I didn’t see my new friend do it and don’t know for a fact he was the culprit, but it matters to me not at all.

He continues to stare, hatred now mingled with defeat, then peels the sticker from the trash can. It comes off easy. Just like they always do. I let him leave, but not without a final word. “You need to show respect around my property.”

“Which one’s yours?”

“Does it matter?”

“Yeah,” he sneers.

“The whole corner,” I say.  ”Anything in eyesight of my kids.”

He walks away and I turn back to the house.

I’m being watched by Cindy, what feels like the entire neighborhood, and our final client of the day standing on our porch and waiting to pick up his son. I wonder what he’s thinking, but then I see the applause on his face and meet it with a smile, relief deep in my bones.

We live in an ancient houses in the oldest part of our city. The neighborhood was overcrowded to start with and has continued to brim. We nurture our corner each day and have helped it to improve  since we planted a flag in our preschool three years back.

Neighborhoods are ecosystems of life, filled with all types of people. Life advances with effort and deteriorates with apathy. Income means nothing and manners are free. I believe in my neighborhood (always have), but the mothers and fathers of today should be paying more attention to the mothers and fathers of tomorrow.

Writer Dad

Sometimes things are better with video. The entire thing clocks in at under a minute and a half.

Enjoy!

Our president was right when he called Kanye a jackass. I’m glad he did and am glad it was recorded. It was a good moment I thought, for our country to see our president being human, expressing an opinion any reasonable person would have a difficult time disagreeing with.

Really, despite his millions of dollars and legions of fans, does Kanye have one true friend in the world? Is there not one person willing to pull him to the side and say, “What are you thinking?” or  “Who do you think you are?” With a father nowhere in sight, either in front or in the rearview, and a mother who recently passed, it looks like Kanye is on his own to decide between right and wrong. I’m guessing this only means there’s more where that came from.

Normally I find Kanye too boring to give a hoot about his antics. As a person I find him rather heinous and don’t think he’s much better as a rapper. He has the flow of a broken faucet and the breath control of an asthmatic. I’m tired after a single verse just imagining him crouched in the corner wheezing. As a producer, I’ll admit he’s remarkable, but so what. If Kanye had one tenth a percent of the talent he thinks he does, the world would have an artist for the ages instead of someone the collective unconscious can’t wait to forget.

I didn’t watch the MTV awards this year, nor did I have the desire. There seems to be a correlation between obnoxiousness and relevance that MTV started ignoring about fifteen years ago and it has only continued to fester each year. Though I didn’t see Kanye’s outburst live, it was on Twitter twenty minutes later, so of course there was no escaping. I bookmarked the link as something to watch later and finally caught up with it the following morning.

Call me a baby all you want, but I cried a bit when I first saw the clip. So did Cindy. Kanye’s always been an egomaniac, but the man standing on the stage thieving a once in a lifetime moment from the widened eyes of a young girl too befuddled and flummoxed to muster the rage the moment deserved, is nothing better than a teeth gnashing, foaming at the mouth monster.

The pain of that moment, imagining my own daughter standing freshly battered on the stage, was simply crushing. I felt Taylor’s disgrace, her immediate sense of bewildered displacement. I could feel her wanting to melt into a cool puddle and ooze off the stage. I wanted someone to come and drag Kanye to the far side of the curtain and beat some sense into him. I can’t imagine the saber rattling echo that bounced against the inner bones of Taylor’s father; Ms. Swift and I don’t share a drop of blood, but I know what I was feeling on her behalf.

I was happy when the audience collectively booed Kanye with their mouths while using their palms to hand Taylor a standing O, and I was thrilled when I clicked onto the clip of Beyoncé. After winning Best Video for Single Ladies, she said:

“Wow this is amazing. I remember being 17 years old and up for my first MTV award with Destiny’s Child. It was one of the most exciting moments in my life. So, I’d like for Taylor to come out and have her moment.”

Taylor came out and delivered a slightly altered version of the same speech she was plundered of a little earlier, and the world was a tiny bit better.

MTV has been too terrible to watch for a while now, but I don’t know if I’ll ever willingly flip to the station ever again. Kanye was a guest at their event. He had no authority whatsoever, as winners are determined by popular vote. Had any other village idiot had the insolence to do what Kanye did, they would have been ejected from the theater and charged with being drunk and disorderly in public.

Later, when Kanye had an opportunity to apologize, he said that he was “only being real.” Yeah you were, Kanye. A real @$$^*!#. Kanye also apologized on his blog. Sorry buddy, not good enough. Any yellow bellied baby mouse can tap out a few words and press publish, or have their ghost blogger do it for them, but it takes a man to look someone they’ve wronged in the eye and own their wrongdoing.

Kanye owes Taylor a whole lot more than he gave, and as an unfortunate role model, he owes the entire nation something as well. I doubt we’ll get it.

What a jackass indeed.

Writer Dad

If you think your children might like to voice an opinion on the Kanye incident, head on over to Children Write the Future for today’s writing prompt. Because Kanye apparently lit my ire this weekend, my post over at the Inkwell asks, are you Kanye or the Fray? And at Ghostwriter Dad, it’s what can Kanye teach you about good business?

Today’s “Writer Dad” is Joel Schwartzberg, author of the book “The 40 Year Old Version.” Today, Joel is sharing an excerpt from his book. After you enjoy the excerpt, you can find more information at Divorced Dad Book dotcom.

One of my earliest publishings was this essay, a version of which appeared on the very popular parenting site Babble.com. Though I had written some non-humor pieces before, this was the first one to directly address my divorce, and my trip from despair and pessimism as a separated father to hope and fulfillment as a divorced dad.

It appears early in my collection “The 40-Year-Old Version” and includes a line that many reviewers pull out as one of the major themes of the book: “It took divorce to make me a better father.”

This essay inspired more on the subject, particularly a controversial piece that appeared in Newsweek’s “My Turn” and many of the related themes in “The 40-Year-Old Version”, but as a writer I’m specifically happy with how I “unpacked” this particular piece.

“Unpacking” is a term my former writing instructor used to describe the process of discovering, then putting into words, the most genuine and raw feelings attached to an emotional journey. Some of those feelings are on the surface, but most of the key, telling, and compelling ones are buried. It’s a personal essayist and memoirist’s job to be an archaeologist of his own soul, then a curator of found objects.

The first draft of this piece probably started with some kind of expository introduction. As an essayist, I’m naturally inclined to step in and play host to my points. But, as a tool, I routinely go back and eliminate the first paragraph of most of my early drafts. As a result, they hit the ground running, and they better engage the reader. This is a good example.

I have a terrible memory, so I’m also very happy I was able to recall some of these key conversations with my kids. The oldest rule in the writing book is to “show, not tell,” and I think the kids’ dialogue does this effectively. Every time I read “No. I like it,” I hear it in my daughter’s sweet voice. Every time. That’s another gift.

Enjoy the piece.

The Pick-Up Artist

“Daddy, lock your doo-wer.” Cindy says as we pull out of my ex-wife’s driveway.

Cindy and her six-year-old twin, Miranda, are already in pajamas and buckled into second-hand car seats, their arms just long enough to flip the door locks. My nine-year-old son Charlie is locked and loaded into the back seat between his sisters.

They’re with me from Friday night to Saturday night every week. We call it “Lazy Dadurday.” And lazy it is. We wake up late, then trek to the bookstore, the pet store, the mall, or the pool, and just let it all hang out.

It amazes everyone except actual parents that kids enjoy an errand run to Kmart just as much as seeing a movie or eating bad pizza in an arcade with oversized mouse robots. My kids love hanging on to the sides of the shopping cart like sanitation workers on a garbage truck as I make gratuitously sharp turns in the hardware aisle. They don’t require these Saturdays to take a page from Fantasy Island. And my joy is simply being with them.

I flip my car door lock per my daughter’s plea, and thank her for looking out for me. Feeling the increasingly familiar weight of sole parental responsibility, I proceed down the long suburban road that will eventually take us from their mother’s home to mine.

“Everything okay, guys?” I ask, glancing at them in the rear view mirror.

“Sure,” offers Charlie.

“I mean with the divorce and all…do you have any questions or worries or anything?”

“Nope,” he replies for all of them.

But Miranda has a question: “Why can’t Mommy sleep at your house with us?”

I imagine the scene — my girlfriend, my ex-wife, me, five cats, three kids, one bedroom.

“Remember, you have two homes: one with Mommy, and one with me,” I say, not answering the question. “You don’t just visit me; you live with me, too.”

I remind the kids that, while other things in life may change, even crumble, a parent’s love never does. The words sound pathetically trite in my head, but it’s the most important thing to convey — not what changes, but what doesn’t: Two parents. Eternal love. Lots of pillows. Endless Cheerios.

In the first few weeks of the separation, I was the one feeling I had lost a firm grip on my own life. Seeking reassurance, I turned not to therapy, but to Google, plugging in search terms as if posing questions to a great swami:

“Fathers and divorce”
“Children of divorce”
“Separated Dads”

What came back was a chorus of single-minded advice: DON’T DO IT.

Think it’ll be better for the kids? WRONG.

Think you’ll find the girl of your dreams? KEEP DREAMING.

Think it’ll make you a better parent? NOT ON YOUR LIFE.

According to almost every web resource on the subject, divorce drives kids bonkers and parents to the poorhouse.

Yet, over a year later, I don’t feel emotionally, financially or parentally bereft. A little stretched, but not impoverished. My children are usually thrilled to see me when I pick them up, and just as excited to return home and share their adventures with their mother.

More importantly, I’ve located my inner parent, the one who tells me when it’s okay to let my son stay up late, and when it’s not; when it’s appropriate to be interrupted on the phone by a whining daughter, and when it’s not; when a tense situation calls for stern rules, or just an all-out, no-shoes family wrestling match. I’ve weaned myself from my parents’, my ex-wife’s, and even Dr. Phil’s parental expectations of me; I now provide my own.

In short, it took divorce to make me a better father.

“Dad, let’s play pod-racer,” says Charlie, a few miles from my garden apartment.

“Okay,” I say, and select the Star Wars theme on my MP3 player. I maneuver around the other cars like a spaceship pilot, dramatically barking navigational orders all the way.

“Commander Cindy, prepare the right side thrusters. On my word….Engage.”

We make a sharp left into my apartment complex, and I hustle the kids out of the car, holding their overnight duffel on my shoulder and their hands in mine. As usual, the bag is overstuffed with art projects, stuffed animals, and board games they’ll never touch while in my twenty-four hours of care, but I’m happy for all the pieces of themselves they care to bring along.

Once inside the apartment, the girls brush their teeth, then burrow their tiny bodies into small Dora- and Pooh-inspired inflatable beds. I get their bedtime “sniff shirts.” One is their mother’s worn blouse from home; the other is my own T-shirt from the laundry basket.

When they first started staying with me overnight, Miranda asked for a “Mommy sniff shirt” to help her sleep. When her sister requested a Daddy version a week later, I couldn’t run fast enough to grab it.

“Eeeeewwwwww,” Cindy said, giving it a strong smell.

“Too stinky?”

“No. I like it,” she replied matter-of-factly, putting the T-shirt to her nose and closing her eyes.

I make some popcorn, which Charlie eats ravenously while playing on the computer. I’m tempted to ask, “So, everything’s really okay?” but enough’s enough. I’m not really looking for answers so much as affirmation anyway, and that’s not worth an interrogation. It’s my children — not Google — who hold the secrets to how this is going to work out, but those truths will be revealed at their own slow pace.

Eventually, Charlie traipses into the bedroom, collapses on the queen-sized bed, and allows himself to be swallowed by the warm comforter.

Hours later, before my girlfriend Anne and I take our positions on the living room’s convertible couch, I peek in the room.

Watching them all silently sleeping, their bodies frozen in soft contortion, I know I should go to bed, too. But I treasure the moment, just as I did after each of them was born. At the time, seeing them asleep came as a relief.

Now, it’s a gift.

“Happy 1st day of Kindergarten!” Max tore into the bedroom a few minutes before 6 a.m., crackling with the fresh current of a looming, life-changing day; a current that only the final slight hesitation before stepping into his new classroom could hope to ground.

“Yes it is!” I rolled over, scooped my boy up and set him between Cindy and I with the mock ease that seemed to ignore every pound he’d picked up since his first day of pre-school.

We exchanged tickles, cuddles and a few last minute Kindergarten queries, before Mia woke up and ran into the room to join us. We did our best to ignore the tick-tick-tock that had been missing all summer, but soon enough we knew it was time to roll out of bed and into the important day.

The morning’s remainder disappeared like mist disguised as minutes while I did my best to prepare for a weekday away from the desktop. There were no more than a few birdcalls outside the window before I ran downstairs two at a time to capture the last of the at-home Kodak moments before we all piled into the van and headed toward school.

We attended to Mia first, finding out who her teacher was and then walking her to a new and slightly altered routine. We squeezed her tight, told her we were proud and wished her well on her first day of 2nd grade. We then crossed the campus to stand in line with the nineteen other parents, surrendering their five years olds into the arms of another.

“I think my teacher will like me,” Max stood beaming between us.

“Your teacher is going to love you,” we both agreed.

Ten minutes later, at approximately 9:09, on 9/9/09 we were singing BUENOS DIAS (our children attend a dual immersion program where the majority of their day is delivered in Spanish) and waving adios to our boy who, I believe we would both agree, had never looked quite so big.

Cindy slipped her fingers between mine and the two of us stepped out of the classroom and into the first few seconds of our brand new life.

We were eager to indulge in our first morning together with a screening of Inglorious Basterds, Quentin Tarantino’s latest. The blood splattered contrast to the early tenderness of the day was of course my idea, but Cindy was all smiles nonetheless. It turned out that the 10:00 a.m. showing was a misprint, so the two of us spent out first hours alone strolling through the bookstore, wondering out loud and wandering without direction while sipping from a cup of coffee that wasn’t brewed by us.

The day sped by a little too fast and soon enough it was time to pick up Max from his first abbreviated day. He bounded out of class, even happier than when we had left him, and enjoyed our hour alone (a circumstantial scarcity for him that his sister never saw for the first two and a half years of her life).

At no time during the day was our new transition more evident than when we picked up Mia. Her hand fell into her brother’s and the two of them started prattling like instant conspirators. He the intrepid explorer and she the wily adventure who had been there before. As for Cindy and I, we’ve no Lewis or Clark to follow. Our future is all frontier, but we are packed, ready and eager to explore.

See you next week!

Writer Dad

Check out “The 5 Things I Wish I Knew Before I Started Blogging,” a letter I wrote to myself and posted at the Inkwell!

“A father carries pictures where his money used to be.”
~Author Unknown

Becoming a dad was the best thing that ever happened to me. Once I got over the complete loss of privacy, the inability to capture a clear thought, and swallowed the fear of the thirty-eight bajillion ways I could potentially mar the mental fabric of my children’s minds forever, I was ready to dive head-first into being a dad.

Every father has fears, some well earned, like wondering if you will be any good at this parenting thing. And others, a bit less likely, what if f I sit my baby down next to another one and then walk away with the wrong kid because all babies look the same?

I am hardly qualified to write a treatise on great parenting. My oldest child is starting second grade and my youngest is about to enter kindergarten. By no means am I attempting to hand down tablets from above filled with universal commandments. The following list is rather a list of suggestions I would have most liked to have been given prior to becoming a father.

10 Ways to be a Great Dad

1) Patience is everything. Practiced composure is like that single drop of super serum that turns that skinny kid into Captain America. It’s easy to lose our patience, and infinitely more difficult to reign it in and redirect it toward a more positive route. Yet allowing our children to see us overly frustrated is never a best case scenario. Go for a walk, take a deep breath, count to ten… or 100. But practice patience from the beginning and you will likely find you have raised a patient child.

2) Read to your child as often as you can. You are reading this right now. You have every tool you need to help your children grow up smart. Endowing children with powerful vocabulary at the earliest possible time is critical to their cognitive development. Start when they are babies, and don’t stop just because they are suddenly able to read the words themselves. Reading with your child is not only a wonderful time for mutual bonding, it also helps to establish a habit that your children can carry forever.

3) Treasure your time with your little ones. The years will turn to vapor soon enough. I am right now having difficulty believing that both my children will be in school full-time, in just a few scant days. Though part of me is, of course, eager for the time I need to blaze through my work load without interruption, there is also a part of me mourning for those minutes I will never hold again. Make the most of your time, no one will give you any more. You’ve probably watched the clock enough at work, don’t do it at home.

4) Treat mom with respect. This one is so big I considered writing it in all caps, but I didn’t want to be annoying. Seriously, don’t drop the ball here. If you show disrespect to your lady, you are crushing a part of your child’s soul and damaging a bit of their future. It doesn’t matter who you are or where you come from, respect is always free. Abuse doesn’t have to be physical and often isn’t. Remember, children learn by example and you are their constant model. Show your son how to properly treat a woman and show your daughter what to look for in a man. Do your small part to make the entire world a slightly better place.

5) Model appropriate behavior. Similar to #4, but different enough to warrant its own entry. Don’t do things in front of your child that you wouldn’t want them to do, at least not in excess. I’m not saying you shouldn’t drink or smoke, but I am saying if you do either one excessively, the behavior will become branded in your child’s eyes. The same goes for all poor manners and negative attitudes; sloth, greed, laziness, anger, and the like. Be yourself, but be your best version as long as your children are watching.

6) Teach independence. Children are often far more capable than what many adults allow themselves to believe. The earlier you start inoculating your child with independence, the more they will be able to help you and themselves to become more capable, well-rounded people. Yes, it can feel frustrating to take the time to teach a two year old to do something that you could do in a fraction of the time, but soon she will be three and have a strong skill set you can easily build upon. You can raise a child with a “Yes I can!” attitude, if you start with “yes you can” first.

7) Let your child’s individuality glimmer. Each of us are unique, yet it is all too easy to project ourselves and our desires onto our children. This rarely does them or us any good. It’s okay to guide them in the right direction, but we should never try to mold our children into what we want at the expense of allowing their true selves to flourish. The best you can do as a parent is to instill your child with the best values you can until those valued are internalized, then stand back and wait for the tree to bear fruit. You want your child to be their best, but sometimes they have to find it themselves.

8) Stand united. Never allow your child to think they can come between you and mom. Unless there is blood or vomit involved, it is probably best to agree in front of the extra set of tiny eyes, and then settle your differences in private. Mom and Dad must always be a team and stand together with every decision. If you want your child to know they can’t penetrate the perimeter of your unity, you have to prove it. And on that note, it’s okay to say NO and mean it when you do. Don’t surrender to their whining or you are only teaching them that it is an effective means of getting their way.

9) Be human. Yes, almost all of us are required to work and no, we can’t always be attendant to our child’s every need. But we can do our best with the time we have, and never make our children feel as though they are a burden to our schedules. Make sure to set aside sacred time each day exclusively for them, and don’t allow anything frivolous to breach the significance of that time. From the lingering minutes when you exchange anecdotes about your days to the memory card moments filled with games and recitals, your focused attention is something they’ll never forget.

10) Be real. You don’t have to be John Wayne. Let your children see all sides of you. Be funny, strict, tender; affectionate, serious and vulnerable. Humans are complicated creatures. By allowing your children to see all sides of you, you will be helping them to understand themselves infinitely more.

No list of ten tips will make you a better anything, not without application placed behind the copy. Do your best every day and if you fumble, do your best to start over tomorrow. The best tip, however, isn’t on the list above. Use common sense and know that your children are watching everything you do. Though you might not realize it, you are the world to them. Do all that you can to make that world a pleasant place to live.

Writer Dad