My dad had a request for Father’s Day this year.
Normally, my family members are champions of the Hegelian dialectic, with our “don’t get me anything! I don’t need anything! I’m just happy to see you!” v. our “but of COURSE I’m getting you something. Don’t be silly. Help me out here!” It always makes sense in the moment.
When we were younger, my two sisters and I, we were Father’s Day cliches, and always got my father a tie. He would smile and wear it the next day and we felt like kickass little gift-givers. Christmas would come around and we’d wonder what to get our dad and we’d think, “Gee, you know what he seems to like? Ties. Maybe we should get him another tie. Not green though, cause we got him a green one for St. Patrick’s Day” and we would get him another tie.
As we got older, we started to realize that we were being a little lazy, and perhaps he wasn’t as overjoyed at our copious tie gifts as he seemed.
We started trying to be more creative. We got him tickets to sporting events or something for his car. We bought him dinner or an ipod. You know, grown up things. Things adults like. And he did like and appreciate them, but we found the more time went on, the more difficult it was to top ourselves. We started getting sort of desperate. “I bet he’d like… a trip in a hot-air balloon. Because he is oh so very fond of heights.” “We could get him a metal baseball bat to put on his desk.” “What do you think he’d think of… a microwavable bowl?”
It all got so much more complicated.
When I was a kid, things were so easy. Giving, receiving, believing… they felt so natural. And as I’ve grown up, I’ve grown a little harder, a little more suspicious of motives and sincerity. I recognize the present face. That’s part of growing up, obviously, but I’m realizing now that eight-year old me wasn’t wrong about everything, and seventeen year old me got some things very wrong. Part of being an adult I think, is realizing that, terrifyingly, sometimes people are sincere.
My dad asked me for a tie last night. He never gets ties for himself, see. He always loved the ties we got him, and he thought they were special because his daughters got them for him. And his ties are starting to fray now. So I went and bought him a tie today. It’s not a very good Father’s Day gift, but I think it might be perfect.
