Watching my father, Harold, interact with my daughter felt like a scene from a contemporary drama rather than a reflection of the past—be it 1924 or even 1974 when I was growing up. Back then, it was rare to see fathers engaged in the daily minutiae of parenting as we do today.
Certainly, this was partly due to the women’s movement not having fully impacted our suburban neighborhood, where traditional roles still prevailed. The idea of “the problem that has no name” might have simply referred to a husband who vanished every day to earn a paycheck while contributing little else. But I also believe some of this detachment stemmed from young dads being just that—young. I have a picture of my father at 22, looking like any typical young man today: late morning, still in his boxers, probably nursing a hangover, and dealing with adolescent acne.
What makes that photo strikingly different from a modern 22-year-old? He’s cradling his infant daughter, my eldest sister. Honestly, at that age, he should have been entrusted with nothing more fragile than an egg—definitely not a baby.
Now at 71, Harold has never boiled water, nor has he ever changed a diaper. My mother often recounts a tale (not out of bitterness) of returning from shopping to find me waddling in a onesie, drenched in my own mess because my dad never took on diaper duties. This was still preferable to when one of her friends had to rush home during a gathering because her husband wouldn’t even attempt to soothe a crying child.
The most vivid memories I have of my dad involve our trips to the local Fairgrounds, where he would hit golf balls and send us racing across the sunburnt grass to retrieve them. On Sunday evenings, while he watched 60 Minutes, we took turns giving him foot massages or scratching his head—he cleverly marketed this as a means to stimulate hair growth, easing our embarrassment about his baldness.
Throughout my childhood, he never read a single book to any of us, which I find deeply saddening. (Dear technology, can you figure out how to bottle that comforting smell of my daughter’s hair while I read her favorite story? Thanks.) Yet, despite recognizing this loss, I confess that when we visit my parents and my husband, Mark, reads to our daughter each morning, I can’t shake the thought: “What would my dad think of this?”
I also wonder what he thinks when Mark helps our daughter reach for things in cabinets she can’t access. I often imagine my dad believing that Mark has lost his masculinity, as if he has been stashed away with the arts and crafts supplies we use for projects.
Strangely, this anxiety is my way of shielding Mark from my father’s outdated judgments. And bless him, Mark knows the drill: We intentionally steer clear of political discussions and the news when we’re with my conservative dad, and we have an unspoken agreement that Mark can lean into traditional masculinity when we’re visiting. (Once, on our way to their house for the weekend, I watched Mark struggle to fit both a stroller and a large golf bag into our packed Subaru—ultimately leaving the stroller behind.)
However, many modern dads, including Mark, can’t simply switch off their involvement. Even when he’s playing the “old-school dad” role at my parents’, he remains actively engaged with our daughter. He wakes up early, makes her breakfast, and takes her to explore the beach. Instead of wondering what my dad thinks, I should ask myself, “What does my mom think?” And trust me, she considers Mark a total hero.
For more insights into home insemination and parenting, check out this excellent resource on pregnancy. If you’re curious about boosting fertility, you can also find helpful supplements here.