Father's Day

It's Father's Day! A day to celebrate our fathers and all that they do. I sent $10 in honor of my dad to Nothing But Nets, one of his favorite charities. The $10 will buy 1 bed net for a child in Africa, and it will help prevent the spread of Malaria. Interested? http://www.nothingbutnets.org/.

I also sent him a book by Bill Bryson, one that he had started reading while he and my mom were visiting me. I did all that I could to make my gift special, to make it enough. Any one of the things would have been fine. And really, thinking about it, a card or even an e-card and a call would have been appreciated. But I'm trying to do something special, something unique, something...enough.

Through no purposeful intent or conscious awareness, and due, I imagine, to his own upbringing, my dad (along with my mom in smaller part) created an atmosphere where perfect was the only thing truly approved.

When my brothers and I spoke about our grades in school, we were told to do our best. But if we didn't get an "A", then we weren't doing our best. I agonized in high school over a class that I

knew I'd get a "B" in. I wanted to drop the class.

I found out later that when my father was younger, he would drop college classes if he thought he wouldn't be able to get an "A" in the class. So it isn't as though the trend in the family started with him. And in many ways, I'm sure that the two of us are alike, and yet, it's not something that I feel.

It's often said that there is a special relationship between fathers and daughters, and it makes me sad to know that he and I don't have a strong or open relationship. With the burden of perfection (unconsciously perceived, if not actively created) it can be impossible to be who you truly are: someone imperfect and flawed and yet for that imperfection and for those flaws, all the more interesting and unique.