Mother Tongue

By Kristen Taylor

The Mother Tongue is a parenting column that Kristen (Juvie's owner) writes. It was published monthly in the Ventura County Star from 2004-2006, and now appears in the Los Feliz Ledger. Kristen's other publishing credits include the Christian Science Monitor, Because I Said So, the Los Angeles Times Magazine, and elsewhere.

May 27, 2010

This One’s for the Dads

Father’s Day is coming right up, and as much as I am not a fan of greeting card holidays and trite sentiment (or maybe because of that), I’d like to take this time to give a huge shout out and a sincere round of applause to all of the fantastic dads that I know. And that’s…well, all of them. If I could buy each and every one of you a beverage of your choice, I surely would.

Is it just me, or have mothers been hogging the spotlight lately? What with the mom bloggers, mompreneurs, and literary “momoirs” getting so much attention this decade, I’m ready to move on to the next parenting pop culture gestalt. I think that this one should be all about the dads. I’m not only crazy about dads and everything that they do; I’m also tired of the competitive mothering thing, where every mom has to be labeled as a Slacker Mom or an Attachment Mom or a Free Range Mom or a Working Mom. We’re all just parents, doing our best, mothers and fathers both.

Dads, if you get ahead of this ball, you can take this Decade of the Dads in any direction you would like, and possibly avoid some of the infighting that goes on in Mom World. My advice? Don’t start any “Daddy and Me” classes, and don’t start blogging about what your kid eats, or where they sleep, or whether or not they watch TV. That will just blow up in your faces. But dads deserve the support of other fathers and society at large, and we’d love to hear what you’ve got to say.

So feel free to toot your own horns a little bit. Women don’t have any inherent advantage in the parenting game, other than the giving birth and first feedings part, so you don’t have to feel reticent about jumping in and taking credit where credit is due. The dads I know, including my own, are so much more than the stereotypical disciplinarians and cash dispensers of yore. This mother, at least, truly appreciates the love and consideration you have for your kids, your devotion to raising them, and your ability to do all of this with sometimes a little more grace than we moms can muster when we’re in the thick of it. Happy Father’s Day.

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