Sublime

My dad was a man of infinite varieties of bitterness, rage, distaste. In my lifelong struggle to avoid becoming him, I’d developed an inability to demonstrate much negative emotion at all.

A good father is steadfast, responsible, loving, understanding, helpful, and gently humorous. He always knows the right thing to do and he does it without fanfare. He can fix anything from a flat tire to a broken heart. And he never gets tired or needs help. What a burden!

He listened to his words fall as if from the mouth of another, and watched his father’s face, which received those words as a stone receives the repeated blows of a fist.

But it was in the nature of fathers, Fred knew, to bully one about expenses: there was always a little storm over his extravagance if he had to disclose a debt, and Fred disliked bad weather within doors. He was too filial to be disrespectful to his father, and he bore the thunder with the certainty that it was transient; but in the meantime it was

The intentional father is deeply invested in discovering who his children are and how he can help them reach their redemptive potential. He seeks to understand the children God has given him and wants to form them into young persons who can fulfill their purpose. He sees parenting as central to his call before God and does it with all of his might.

But what you may not know about my father is that he never really took a day off, not for his wife and sons and not for us. He believed in the value of work. Even during holidays, he was attached to his phone, reviewed papers after everyone had gone to bed. Because he felt this enormous responsibility to take care of us all. He was afraid. What if