potrero view

June 2009

Publisher’s View: Father’s Day

By Steven J. Moss

“You’re going to have three kids,” my seven-year old daughter Sara announced, after examining the number of lines on my wrist.  I tried not to wince as she held up her arm for me to predict her child-bearing fortune.

I came to fatherhood at an age that used to be called late.  Sara was born when I was 40 years old.  She was the second of my wife’s three significant pregnancies.  We lost what would have been a son to a still-born delivery more than five months into term; and chose to abort a fetus after tests indicated significant abnormalities.  Both would have been boys.  The loss of these almost sons pops like painful bubbles in my head when I see other young girls playing with their brothers,  or when Sara alludes to her desire for a sibling.

For most of my life I did everything possible to avoid becoming a father.  It wasn’t just about birth control, but a stereotypical male unwillingness to commit to anything more than an afternoon bike ride.  It was half-way through our marriage before I started calling my partner, Debbie, my  “wife,” and I didn’t acknowledge that I fully wanted Sara until the minute she was born.  I can’t explain this poor citizenship when it comes to family, at least not in a few sentences.  Mostly, I just didn’t want to grow up.

I made good use of my pre-fatherhood time.  By the time Sara arrived I’d traveled extensively on five continents, spending significant time in Israel, Senegal, and South Africa.  I co-founded an economic consulting firm and founded a nonprofit.  I invested time and money in various forms of therapy, trying to figure out who I was and who I wanted to be.  I became the person I am now.

Except from a biological perspective, becoming a father isn’t like turning on a light switch.  It’s akin to making tea:  a sudden splash into boiling water, followed by a slow transformation.  But from the day Sara was born I made a few commitments that I’m glad I’ve kept.  When she was a baby I spent one full day during the work week with her; since she entered preschool, and now elementary school, I’ve picked her up every day before 4 p.m., and frequently earlier; and I took her to swimming lessons when she turned three, driving to Half Moon Bay once a week for almost two years.  Today Sara swims like a mermaid, and we’re as close as a father can be with his daughter.

As late-breaking parents know, there’s no small irony that we spend much of our lives trying not to get pregnant, and are left with a short sprint doing everything we can to have children.  Though my wife and I have flirted with adopting, chances are we’ve created the family we’re going to be.  We recently added a dog, Lucky, whose name, given to him by my daughter, is a good description of me.

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