It’s Cool to Be a Dad
Sarah and The Goon Squad | September 14Matthew from Childsplayx2 here. It’s Goomah time once again! This month I’m pleased to be able to introduce to you the lovely and talented (except when it comes to choosing Fantasy Football teams, but I digress) Sarah from Sarah and the Goon Squad. Sarah and I are comrades in spirit as we are both the parents of twins. Sarah is my idol because she manages to make parenting twins look fun and easy all of the time.
It’s fitting that she chose to write about how cool it is to be a Dad because I’ve commented to her before that, in my book, she’s an honorary dad out here in the blogosphere. She drinks beer, she watches obsesses over football and doles out trash talk like you were talking to your paisan down at the bar.
Anyway, without further ado, I would like to welcome Sarah as our July August September Goomah.
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As far back as I can remember, I’ve always wanted to be a Goomah.
Maybe I should clarify that. When Alan (aka BIYF) first told me about “The Blogfathers” I wanted to be a Goomah. Early on somebody (I can’t remember if it was Alan or Matthew) told me that I was on the list of women they were going to ask to participate. I was very excited. I had a whole post all figured out in my mind about my favorite Goomah of all time - Janice Rossi.Then Busy Mom and MIM wrote their Goomah posts, and they were all sweet and about their fathers and grandfather. These ladies wrote lovely, touching tributes to fathers in their lives and suddenly I felt that writing an essay on my favorite kept woman in a Scorsese film would be crass. Plus, Alan said this was supposed to have something to do with dads or husbands.
Fine.
You would think this would be easy. Several of my closest friends are fathers and husbands, most of my favorite bloggers are fathers and husbands (I have more, but I ran out of words to link*), my Dad is a father and a husband, my husband is a father and a husband. It seems like I would have a ton of material to work with, but I decided to write about why I think it is cool to be a Dad.
1) It is cool to be a Dad because your children think you can fix anything. Even though it isn’t always true, I imagine it feels really good to have someone think you are Superman.
2) It is cool to be a Dad because people expect you to watch football and drink beer. As a Mom, if I say I can’t go shopping because there is a game on the other ladies look at me like I have ten heads.
3) It is okay if Dad’s fart, or talk about farting, or laugh about farts.
4) You get to have children without ever actually having to be pregnant. I know that some men wish they could experience pregnancy, but trust me when I say it is overrated. You also never have to give birth. Now, technically, I didn’t have to push anyone out through my private parts either, my babies were born by cesarean, but that sucked too.
This is the part where I have to give props to my husband. Although he never gave birth, he was present for the delivery, and since we have twins he got to go over to watch one set of doctors check on Ian (Yes, one set of doctors, it was a zoo in my operating room. We had two of everything in there. Two nurses, two surgeons, two NICU doctors, two respritory specialists, etc.) after he was born. He turned around as they were taking Claudia out and he accidentally saw my insides. He says he saw my ribs. That is way grosser than anything I saw when they were born. I feel bad he has to live with that.
5) When you get your wife pregnant everybody acts like you did a good job sticking it to her. Seriously. When we found out we were having twins other guys would pat Gabe on the back and say “Hey, good job.” *wink wink*. Nobody ever, ever insinuates that the pregnant woman did a good job having sex - unless you aren’t married, and then they just act like you are a slut.
6) Daddy’s Little Girl. You guys know exactly what I am talking about. Now I know that mothers and daughters (and mothers and sons and fathers and sons) can have very special relationships, but there seems to be a very special father/daughter thing. Even if your daughter is 16 and calls you “Dad” or “Father” and rolls her eyes at you thirty times a day, in her mind you are still Daddy.
In all seriousness, as much as I love being a Mommy, I think that being a Daddy is great, and cool, and I hope you all realize how much we appreciate you and how much you do for us. Thank you.
* If I left you out, I’m sorry. Linking gets really boring after a while.
Being a Dad is a privilege. I do wish more would take it a bit more seriously though. Sometimes I find it tough to know if fathers have a dog or a child since they act pretty much the same. You points are all spot on. My wife gave birth twice while in my lap and it was a surreal feeling. I kind of wish I looked away a few more times. I’m afraid that if men were the ones giving birth there would be no more children……
Nice weekend and thanks for your post
AD
[…] The Blogfathers have given me respect by choosing me for the Goomah for September. Go over there today and read why I think it’s cool to be a dad. […]
Great post.
Fixing anything? So true. Wives think so too, BTW!
Daddy’s little girl? If I hadn’t had a girl for #2, we’d still be trying. It’s the best! However, those belly shirts are getting on my nerves…
The rib thing? So true. I actually got queesy the second time (small room, lots of doctors and nurses, warm weather) and had to be sat down. Man, was my wife pissed.
It didn’t take long for me to get annoyed with the ‘good job’ winks and nudges from guys. Conception is the least challenging part of fatherhood. I thought everyone knew that men had sex with their wives…
On the subject of Daddy/Daughter relationships, I stumbled across this picture today which says it all.
@Vincenzo: I almost passed out on the third time round. It was the eipdural needle that made my eyes roll in my head. Almost went down, but a midwife noticed I was having a white-out and sat me down.
Great post, Sarah! All your points are so true (especially #6).
Combine #2 and #3 and you have a damn fine Sunday afternoon.
What Matthew omitted from his description of our new Goon-mah Sarah, is that she put the Fantasty in our recent fantasy football draft. Sarah has a top dollar phone sex quality voice people. I blame her entirely for my distracted selection of Drew Bledsoe. Damn you woman!
(Call me)
Alan - My wife reads this blog so I can’t talk about Sarah’s sexy voice.
Awwww. You guys are so sweet.
I think.
You might be total pervs. It’s hard to tell tone of voice in a comments section.
Thanks, I really needed that. I’ll be a dad in a couple o’ days.
Cheers!
#5 is classic.
I agree on all your points
I am trying to make the same list but for moms’…
1. There is no gratitude for Moms’ who actually fixes everything!
2. As a mom you can take the afternoon to go shopping and not be judged by it… Imagine the father saying… I’m off shopping for the afternoon, see ya later… I think he would be judged most harshly by other fathers!!! (shopping is actually lots of fun with the kids)
3. I have no reply to that one!
4. Well you get inflated boobs for a while… My private part is never going to get bigger… That has to count for something?!?
5. Hopefully for the female she is the one who was courted to have sex… (it’s not much but it’s something)
6. On the last note….I have a daughter and when she is going to be 18 I would prefer by far to be a mom ’cause I know what is going on in that boy’s mind!!!
This was such a great list Sarah! It makes me realize how much I appreciate my husband and my father. I may have to write a tribute to each of them one of these days. Sooner than later, of course.
[…] Vincenzo from Will Daddy Come Too nominated the guest post I wrote for The Blogfathers - It’s Cool to Be a Dad. Thank you, Vincenzo. It is a real honor. […]
[…] Here’s the list of this month’s winners: Petroville awarded Her Bad Mother Suburban Turmoil awarded Corporate Mommy Mysterious Lady awarded Whiskey Talking Organized Chaos awarded Notes from the Trenches Here in the Hills awarded Heartsongs Miss Cellania awarded Simply Left Behind Mama Drama awarded Waking Up Wallpaper of my Mind awarded Worth Ten Thousand Words Aka Monty awarded Beauty Dish Wordgirl awarded V-Grrrl in the Middle I Obsess awarded Rock the Cradle Halushki awarded Lemon Parade Sunshine Scribe awarded Blog Antagonist Never That Easy awarded Wallpaper of My Mind Unexplored Territory awarded Amalah My Own Circle of Confusion awarded Hygiene Chronicles @ Blogfathers Crouching Mommy, Hidden Laundry awarded Adventures of a Domestic Engineer Life, the Universe and Everything awarded KY Coop Cast One Lazy Lesbian awarded The Lesbian Lifestyle Mary Tsao awarded MotherGooseMouse Masked Mom awarded Iowa Drift Bub and Pie awarded State of Discontent Peanut’s Mom awarded First Year or Last Will Daddy Come Too awarded Sarah and the Goon Squad The Fat Lady Sings awarded Soul Gardening Metro Mama awarded Sunshine Scribe Mystery Mommy awarded The Wait and the Wonder Pass the Torch awarded Pensieve The Silent I awarded The Lotus Life The Pink Diary awarded Almost Somewhat Positive Oh The Joys awarded What It Is Lady M awarded Bub and Pie Chicken and Cheese awarded Wordgirl Something Blue awarded IzzyMom Notes From the Trenches awarded Journey Mama So Anyway awarded Spin Me I Pulsate […]
A nice post written on my daughter’s birthday. Thanks.
[…] This month, I have nominated Sarah, of Sarah and the Goon Squad. She was guest blogging Goomah on The Blogfathers on how It’s Cool to be a Dad. What I liked most about the post is it’s sense of humor about traditional ‘Dad things’ while still respecting the role that we play in the lives of our children. Moms will cringe, Dads will cheer, and everyone will laugh. […]