Wostfulness-Free Father's Day Post

Today is the actual Father's Day. As I write this, my father in law is fast asleep on the couch behind me, Wifey is on the other computer showing her mother Polish web sites, and D2 is napping. D1 is at Disney World with her boyfiend, paying big money to wait in long lines. I hate Disney World.

Both Ds emailed me lovely messages for FD. And the truth is, I'm damn proud. I take my job as their Dad extremely seriously, and, all modesty aside, am the best Dad in the world.

After trying and winning a few trials as a young lawyer, I realized that Law didn't do it for me. I've been lucky to make a good living at it, but my identity as a lawyer is a small part of who I am.

I'm a pretty good husband. I could be better. I'm still a work in progress. I AM an excellent friend. I take the true meaning of friendship to heart --I truly exhalt my friends' accomplishments, and I hate it when they find sadness.

But fatherhood? That's my number one identity. It has been since November, 1988.

My father in law loves his daughter, but truly lacks the capacity to communicate with her or offer life wisdom. He's gruff. He's stuck in many ways in his adolescence --the age he was when the Nazis kidnapped him and killed his parents.

When he arrived today, he barked a request that I notarize one of his many affidavits showing he's still alive, so the German government has to continue paying his reparations. As a proud Jew myself, I rather enjoy the fact that, 2 generations after WW II, those bastards are still paying for their crimes. I like to think of a 20 something clerk in an office in Munich somewhere signing a check each month for Jewish pensioners living in Broward County, Florida, and thinking "Vat the fuck?"

As Archie Bunker might have said: "Don't screweth with the Chosen People..."

Anyway, Wifey wished her Dad a happy Day, and I'm having one myself.

D2 turns 18 in February, and my legal job as a father is done. Of course, my moral, ethical, and loving job will continue as long as I'm on this Earth.

Happy Father's Day, Dave!