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Move over Mommy, It's Daddy Time
April 13, 2007
I've been noticing, coming in on the heels of the many mommy memoirs, several narratives by fathers--daddy chronicles. And I don't think it's just that as a newish first-time father I'm paying more attention to these books. Perhaps we might be entering the era of the stay-at-home-dad-as-writer.
The first book I saw this season was by Chicago writer Elisha Cooper called Crawling: A Father's First Year. Then came novelist-as-dad Neal Pollack, who struggles with balancing papa-hood with his hip, partying life in Alternadad. Most recently, in Dadditude: How a Real Man Became a Real Dad, media-man Philip Lerman looks back on his experiences becoming a father a bit later in life--say, over 40. Just this week was a book about a father's plight to adopt a girl from China, called China Ghosts: My Daughter’s Journey to America, My Passage to Fatherhood by Jeff Gammage (which will be reviewed in our April 23 issue).
And all of these bring to mind a book that came out about five years ago. It's called It Takes a Worried Man. In it, school teacher Brendan Halpin struggles to raise his daughter while his wife is being treated for metastatic breast cancer. It was brutal for sure, but his blend of optimism and unforced wit took a bit of the edge off.
The memoir came out in 2002--well before I became a father--but it resonates with me still.
Posted by Mark Rotella on April 13, 2007 | Comments (0)
