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The Upside of A Hands-On Dad

The Upside of A Hands-On Dad

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Fighting Sargassum

Community Colleges

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I was studying her tiny face when I realized that I couldn't remember
what my two older children, now 6 and 4, looked like at this age. I see photos
around the house, but I honestly can't remember living through those moments.
It's because I was working too much, traveling a lot, and commuting an hour to
an office each day.

    
Now, my life has changed. This is my seventh Father's Day but the first
one spent working from home. Anyone who has ever done this knows what an
oxymoron it can be. I spend the day chasing the clock, or having it chase me. I
squeeze in child care and carpool between columns, deadlines, emails,
interviews, reading and invoices. Time flies.

    
We hear about how moms who work outside the home have to juggle jobs and
family. Working dads don't juggle. We weave. I get about six hours of sleep a
night, and I divide the other 18 between work and family but not in that order.
Family gets two-thirds of the time; work gets a third. It's my job to weave
everything I need to do around my kids' schedules. My "office" these
days is a neighborhood coffee shop. When the baby is napping, or the two older
children are at school, or grandma and grandpa pitch in, I get a lot done in a
short period of time. In the early morning or late at night, words flow easily.
The rest of the day, it's game on.

    
It gives new meaning to the phrase "multitasking." I recently
did an interview for a radio show in Los Angeles, holding the phone with one
hand while feeding my baby with the other.

    
Still, there's a significant upside: I'm getting a second chance at
being a hands-on dad.

    
That's what they call us these days: Hands-on dads. We make breakfasts,
pack lunches, wash dishes, drive kids to school, feed babies, take kids to the
park, make dinner, wash more dishes and -- best of all -- read bedtime stories.
And then, when the kids are sleeping, we get to go to work.

    
In my father's generation, taking care of the kids was usually what mom
did -- along with cooking, laundry, housekeeping and often working outside the
home. Those days are gone. That generation of men, and every generation before
it, doesn't know what it missed. Being a hands-on dad is my toughest job, and
my most rewarding.

    
For the men of the 21st century, it's not enough just to provide a
paycheck. We're working longer hours than ever before. That's a given. But, at
home, we're not off the hook. We have to help our partner by lightening the
load, and we have to be actively involved in the day-to-day raising of our
kids. Not by hiring nannies, or -- as my working parents did when I was
finishing elementary school -- leaving a key under the mat and an afterschool
snack on the kitchen table. Expectations are higher now -- not only for women
but also for men.

    
Real men need to be present for their kids' lives.

    
You've heard about the "mommy wars" where some women make it their
business to tell other women how to make the proper choices about balancing
career and family.

    
Men don't play that game, either because we respect each other's
choices, or because we're just too exhausted at the end of the day to judge one
another over neighborhood poker games.

    
But this doesn't mean we're not thinking about the choices we make, and
second-guessing them.

    
A couple of years ago, a top television network executive confided in me
-- and I in him -- that what we worry about most and what we feel most guilty
about is not the challenge of being a provider. It's the fear that we're
spending too much time working and not enough time just being "dad."

    
An old friend who is now a high-powered corporate lawyer earning a
seven-figure income told me over lunch a few months ago that it breaks his
heart when his kids ask: "Dad, do you really have to work on
Saturday?"

    
Good luck, Gentlemen. There are no magic formulas to getting this right.
All I know is that these moments fly by and they never come back, and that's
what second chances are for.

    
Happy Father's Day.

    

    
© 2011, The Washington Post Writers Group

    

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