I have never played golf with my father. Never went fishing. Went camping once or twice, but never on a hike. Never went skiing, horseback riding, played touch football in the yard (didn’t have a yard), and while I am old enough to have played stickball, it was with the father of the kid downstairs, not my own.
In my household, with my father, the primary dad-kid activity was watching television, sports primarily, and this was something we shared from a very young age. Darryl Strawberry, Dwight Gooden, Keith Hernandez, Lawrence Taylor (why were all my sports heroes addicts?), watching them succeed and fail, were the fly-fishing-in-Montana moments of my youth.
Let me get this straight–I don’t approve. I have tried as best as I could to be active with JP–hiking, biking, going to museums, playing in the park, even just taking a walk. Heck, I even bought a book on learning how to tie knots, so if and when we ever go sailing (I have a buddy who owns a boat), I’ll be able to pull my weight.
I simply don’t want him to think of me as the guy he couldn’t or wouldn’t get off the couch. And yet…
I still like watching sports. This wasn’t one of my weekends with JP, so there was no conflict about my watching a bit of football (and my girlfriend, god love her, actually likes football), so it was no problem. But what of next weekend? And the Super Bowl?
JP, to date, has shown no interest in watching sports. It’s not that he in particular doesn’t like sports but rather that he doesn’t really like TV, which is good. But what if he never likes sports? Does that mean I can’t take him to the Mets? Or that if I don’t want to be my dad, then I have to give it up? And if I encourage him to watch, am I manipulating him into a bad habit?
Oh boy. It’s (almost) enough to make you want to quote Philip Larkin:
They fuck you up, your mum and dad.
They may not mean to, but they do.
They fill you with the faults they had
And add some extra, just for you.
But they were fucked up in their turn
By fools in old-style hats and coats,
Who half the time were soppy-stern
And half at one another's throats.
Man hands on misery to man.
It deepens like a coastal shelf.
Get out as early as you can,
And don't have any kids yourself.