Maggie's Farm

We are a commune of inquiring, skeptical, politically centrist, capitalist, anglophile, traditionalist New England Yankee humans, humanoids, and animals with many interests beyond and above politics. Each of us has had a high-school education (or GED), but all had ADD so didn't pay attention very well, especially the dogs. Each one of us does "try my best to be just like I am," and none of us enjoys working for others, including for Maggie, from whom we receive neither a nickel nor a dime. Freedom from nags, cranks, government, do-gooders, control-freaks and idiots is all that we ask for.

Our Recent Essays Behind the Front Page

Much Sorry with Delays
Birth, Death and All That Stuff in Between
How to Honor Labor Day, Every Day
My Yom Kippur Miracle (Repost from 2010)
Good intro to fly casting
Peach update, with pie
NYC update
Easy for you to say: To the elites on mass immigration
For NYC on 9/11, Sailors' Snug Harbor
Pickled Peaches
Water Shoes
Labor Costs in U.S.
Your "identity"
Good news about The Great Courses
Uses of Hot Pepper Jelly/Sauce, Chutneys, and Jams
A Saturday Drive to Litchfield County, CT
How to Pick a Kayak
Civilized: Fruit forks and knives
Loads of kayaking on Cape Cod
Psychology Experiments' Questionable Results

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Sunday, June 17. 2007

Father's Day

As narrow-minded, knuckle-dragging traditionalists, we Maggie's Farmers honor fathers: fathers that stick around and do their best to do what grown men need to do for their families and for their communities.

Few of us can reach the Atticus Finch ideal.

Here are a few Dad-related links from our archives:

The Incredible Shrinking Father

A few pretty sailboats

M200 carbine

Are boys just defective girls?

Bring back dueling!

Fine powerboats: This one and this one

David Grossman's Ode to his son Uri

What do men want?

Posted by Bird Dog in The Culture, "Culture," Pop Culture and Recreation at 05:46 | Comments (8) | Trackbacks (0)

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You may want to add this one to your list:

http://www.blackfive.net/main/2007/06/happy_fathers_d.html
#1 rightwingprof (Link) on 2007-06-17 08:48 (Reply)
I am married to one who comes close to that ideal--myself, and our daughters are lucky women!!
#2 apple pie on 2007-06-17 11:27 (Reply)
God bless fathers who really are fathers !
#3 Paul (Link) on 2007-06-17 20:00 (Reply)
Those Winter Sundays

Sundays too my father got up early
and put his clothes on in the blueblack cold,
then with cracked hands that ached
from labor in the weekday weather made
banked fires blaze. No one ever thanked him.

I'd wake and hear the cold splintering, breaking.
When the rooms were warm, he'd call,
and slowly I would rise and dress,
fearing the chronic angers of that house,

speaking indifferently to him,
who had driven out the cold
and polished my good shoes as well.
What did I know, what did I know
of love's austere and lonely offices?
.
Robert Hayden
.
#4 Phoenix on 2007-06-18 00:16 (Reply)
I love that poem. I've been saving it for today.

The last two lines knock me out.


.

I always wonder about the filial thing - about why it takes so many years for a child to understand his parents. Youth and innocence aside, it seems to me much time is wasted before one's offspring comes around and sees his parents as people.
.
#5 Phoenix on 2007-06-18 00:19 (Reply)
Some things just need time, i guess. No substitutes for the necessaries. Great poem, P.

This is pretty good:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB118187989837036535.html?mod=taste_primary_hs
#6 buddy larsen on 2007-06-18 21:44 (Reply)
"How do I raise my sons to be better than their father?"

What a cool article. Sure raised a few talking points, though - with the AAUW making weenies out of men by insisting 'For in my way they lie." (I changed Bill's words a tad.) Stupid feminists. They've done more to ruin our society than anything else.

Anyway, for those of us who didn't come from great childhoods, and even for those of us who are naturally thoughtful, I love that line, "How do I raise my sons to be better than their father?"

Step 1: Break whatever legacy held you down.
.
#7 Phoenix on 2007-06-18 22:06 (Reply)
Right--otherwise that "seven generations" thing just keeps replicating forward.

That essay was pretty honest & direct re the challenge the author feels. He evidently has a regular column (a link at bottom, IIRC)--think I'll read it.
#8 buddy larsen on 2007-06-18 23:32 (Reply)

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