Thread by @DaddieMarto

Fathers Day. A Thread.

I grew up without my father for a better part of my childhood. For the man that I currently am, I am glad I grew up without him. This speaks to the man that he is not the father that he is.

In a male human is the man, the friend, and if they so choose, is the father, the husband. These individuals can exist in one person and be in total contrast to each other in personality. Not every man makes a good friend. Not every husband makes a good father, and vice versa

When I came of age, I confronted my father on the man that he is because he had hurt me. Story for another day, but in short my father and I are no longer in speaking terms.

He said things, called me things, did things, but I still held out my respect for him because he is my father despite his flaws. And still I celebrate Father’s Day for my father and not my mother.

Because I can’t erase the role he played and credit my mother for fathering me. She mothered me well as a provider, protector and coverer, but my mother can never be my father, could never fill that space and never will.

I was so sure of this when I went through a crisis that made me doubt myself as a man and I craved for fatherhood, yearned for my father in that moment. He did not come through, so I had to call out the man in me for me.

Having not been fathered I am figuring it all out by myself, I could be wrong, but at-least I am well aware to be on the look out for any way I am stumbling in my fatherhood. That in itself is more than the generation before us was capable of.

Have some fathers failed in one way or another? Yes. But can we celebrate them who had a positive impact in our lives? Not all fathers left. Not all fathers abused. Not all fathers were emotionally unavailable. Not all fathers were irresponsible.

By celebrating the positives we are imparting the next generation to yearn to be celebrated. To yearn to do it right, to yearn to be aware. We all make the fathers we want to have. The ones before us are long gone, we can do something about the ones that come after us.

Let’s celebrate fathers on #FathersDay2022 Fathers that showed up and held on. #MaNaPaTau