It’s not so much about how to father as how to family
When my book, “A Song for Lost Angels: How Daddy and Papa Fought to Save Their Family,” got nominated for a Benjamin Franklin Award in 2015, there was a minor uptick in sales. For one week it was in the top 10 in books about parenting on Amazon.
Parenting? I don’t know what genre I expected the book to be in. Romance? Memoir? LGBTQ? Science fiction?
“Kevin knows as much about parenting as he does about running a threering circus,” Brother X joked.
He’s right. But you know what? Love your clowns and the rest will follow.
In 1946, Dr. Benjamin Spock published “On Parenting,” and as sufficient as that was, maybe I’ll write my own, but not so much about how to father, but how to family. As much as we raise our boys, they, too, are raising their dads.
The boys have started checking up on me. They’ll say things like, “Put on your seat belt. Stay in the crosswalk.” Zane’s taller than me by almost a head, so when he volunteers to carry the groceries, I let him.
This summer, when neither son had to be anywhere at any given time, I still needed to go to bed by 9:30 p.m. to be in time for morning muster.
It started as a joke: The boys took turns telling me a bedtime story about a misfit family whose names were Nivek, Nairb, Enaz and Nadia and how, along with their magical flying rescue dogs, they found their way to a bungalow in the fictional inner, inner, inner, inner Roislecxe. When they ran out of stories, it became riddles and/or just questions. As I drifted into sleep, Aidan asked me, “Daddy, when you wake up, does the dream go on without you?” I still don’t know the answer.
Which brings me to Chapter 1 of the book I would write: You don’t win with authority. Authority lasts only until your back is turned. You better have influence.
Nurse Vivian got away with a fair amount of “Because I said so.” That doesn’t work with my boys. Each came with special conditions, and Zane’s was an inability to say “yes.” Aidan simply must know how things work. I cannot tell him to separate the lights from the darks in the laundry “because I said so.” Instead, he demands the history of bleach, and debates why we needed to launder when Aidan likes his clothes a little dirty. Chapter 2: Be present. Chapter 3: Influence doesn’t always work. My husband, Brian, insists that my charm does not work on teenagers, it only embarrasses them. So, if you don’t have influence, use trickery. Here’s how I toilettrained Zane: I threw Cheerios in the bowl and challenged him that I had better aim.
Chapter 4: Children are not problems. They are challenges. We do our best to avoid schools where they claim that one of our sons is difficult. We prefer the term “spirited.” I don’t know what the bungalow would be like if there were normal people in it. I do know all four of us have challenges, and the way we overcome them makes us better.
For example, Aidan has an eating “challenge.” So, to get food in him, some nights we have snacky dinners and some nights we have Sundae Mondays, which means whatever you want as long as you put hot fudge on top.
Chapter 5: You can either choose to be right or choose to be happy. My husband’s better at this than me, and here’s his advice: You can either beat your son at “Words With Friends,” or you can teach him to enjoy the game.
Last chapter (for now): There’s only one lesson you must teach your child: Be kind.
Kevin FisherPaulson’s column appears Wednesdays in Datebook. Email: datebook@sfchronicle.com
Nurse Vivian got away with a fair amount of “Because I said so.” That doesn’t work with my boys. Each came with special conditions.