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June 20, 2006
On Gentle Fathering.
When a father is assaulted with a weapon of any sort, what is his first response? Nature, while incompetently equipping the brains of children, has quite properly furnished to every being the desire for self-preservation. There are numerous instances which may be quoted in support of this assertion. And if the reader will send a minimum donation of sixteen dollars, upon receipt of the deposit, I shall be happy to forward the required information. But to return to my subject; what, I ask, is a father to do when his cad of a boy attacks him with a water gun? The only intelligent thing that he can: He must defend himself.
Now my wife is a genteel and retiring woman. There has never been an instance in our marriage of nearly ten years when she has even attempted to raise her voice to me. The reader may imagine my shock at her response to my actions of self-defense.
I had just finished gently placing my son’s face in the grass. I give my word of honor that the scratches on his nose are so small and so insignificant that one cannot, without great difficulty, observe them. Indeed, without a penetrating glance of no less than one second, they are hardly noticeable.
As I was in the process of wresting myself from the formidable powers of my five-year-old—to speak more clearly: as I was filling his underwear with water from our garden hose—it was then that I heard a slight snuffing sound; it came from the direction in our yard where my wife reposed like some modern-day Venus.
I have not yet told you that I am gentle. I am. Thus, in order to keep my boy from perpetrating some further assault upon my person—which assault he would, no doubt, later regret—I carefully positioned my posterior squarely upon his back. (Or should that be roundly?) Either way, my position was clear to him as I turned to face his mother.
Her face was the picture of serenity. Angels in heaven who behold the face of God do not attain the placidity which shone of her face that day. She uttered not a word as she hastened our way. Instead, breathlessly, she made her way to where we were. Upon her arrival she convinced me that my actions were somewhat more severe than was necessary. This point she drove home with a two-by-four which was lying near our unfinished tree house. Being astute, I understood her perfectly. But I surmise that, should she have been on the other side of the house where I thought she was, my son’s convincing and heartfelt apologies, rendered gently to me by use of his teeth; these, I say, would have melted the heart of any father, and I would have quickly forgiven him the assault.
After all, I am a gentle and forgiving father.
Parenting | By Carl | 01:19 AM
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