{"id":1829,"date":"2018-06-28T19:18:55","date_gmt":"2018-06-29T02:18:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/trampleasure.net\/lee\/?p=1829"},"modified":"2019-05-22T08:42:14","modified_gmt":"2019-05-22T15:42:14","slug":"happy-fathers-day-to-all-my-fathers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/trampleasure.net\/lee\/2018\/06\/happy-fathers-day-to-all-my-fathers\/","title":{"rendered":"Happy fathers’ day to all my fathers"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"photo<\/a><\/p>\n

On Fathers\u2019 Day this year, I heard a sermon by Rev. Vanessa Rush Southern at the Unitarian Church of San Francisco<\/a> that challenged member of the congregation to think of all the \u2018fathers\u2019 in our lives. \"Bill<\/a>As one who is not a biological father, and has only experienced a child\u2019s early years with my granddaughter\u2014both my stepdaughter joined my life when they were over 13\u2014I was moved by this idea of celebrating the \u2018unusual fathers\u2019 in our lives. I reflected, and came up with five fathers I have had.<\/p>\n

\"Scott<\/a>My first father, my biological father, is Bill Trampleasure<\/a>. Bill passed away almost five years now, and he was with me my entire life. My second father was Jack<\/a>. Jack was a PE teacher at my junior high (ML King in Berkeley), but I never had him as a teacher\u2014instead Jack had a group of kids who went out running before <\/i>school. My third and fourth fathers were Scott<\/a> and Steve<\/a>. Both these men were about ten years older than me, and I was involved in peace\/anti-nuclear work with them for several years in my late teens\/early twenties. My \"Steve<\/a>fifth father was Jose, my boss from about age 20-33 (with a four year gap in the middle).<\/p>\n

OK, fathers, here come my thanks. <\/b><\/h2>\n

Bill<\/strong><\/span>. Dad, you taught me about being a man who didn\u2019t need to conform to traditional male stereotypes. As a man of born in the 1920\u2019s, you were fairly traditional, but you weren\u2019t afraid to cry, tell me you love me, and wear some wild colors. You also taught me about learning how to do something because it needed to get done, even if you weren\u2019t quite sure how to do it. And you showed me that we men don\u2019t need to be defined by our anger. While you did give me some \u2018bad examples\u2019 of fathering, you often owned up to them, and apologized when appropriate. You taught me the value of being an individual peacemaker as well as a global one.<\/p>\n

Jack<\/strong><\/span>. Somehow, Jack, you got me running before<\/i> school. I wasn\u2019t involved in athletics before that, more inclined to keep busy with math or science or building something, but somehow you got me and a bunch of other tweens out there running around Berkeley early in the morning. You taught us to love the activity, to not worry about how fast or far we went, or what place we got in races. You did help us think about improving our speed\/distance, but it was competing against ourselves that was important, not comparing to others. I kept running off and on during my life, switching to the bicycle at times, but I have you to thank for getting me to believe that exercise could be fun.<\/p>\n

Scott<\/strong> <\/span>and Steve<\/strong><\/span>. You guys taught me about being an activist, how to organize, and how to work with others. You were examples of men committed to nonviolent change, and remembering that how <\/i><\/b>we work in groups <\/i>is as important as the message we send out from our groups. Steve, I remember your stories about standing with the Berkeley Peace Brigade in a line between the protestors and the ROTC building, sending the message that destruction is not a way to advocate for peace. Scott, I remember your focus on helping our groups learn about processes for working together, as well as how to raise money\u2014that thing many organizers hate to do. Thank you both, for all the tools you helped me put in my toolbox that I still use in organizing (and teaching<\/i>) today.<\/p>\n

Jose<\/strong><\/span>. Oh, Jose. I think you may not know how much you helped me. At age 20, you put me in charge of concessions at UC Berkeley sporting events. Wow, what faith you had in me: a longhaired, somewhat cocky, young man. You kept your eye on me, but also gave me much more control than perhaps many others would have. I think, in general, I returned your trust with follow through\u2014but I know there were times here and there where you probably thought to yourself \u201cWhat is that guy going to do next?\u201d I learned a lot about business and record keeping from you; and some you let me learn on my own (I remember taking the spreadsheet you provided for concession stand inventory check in\/out and making adjustments to it so it would total all the remaining inventory and help me determine how much I needed to order for the next game).<\/p>\n

So, to my five fathers, I say \u201cHappy belated Fathers\u2019 Day.<\/strong><\/span>\u201d Belated both in being a week or so late, but also belated for being years late. I\u2019m sure there are other men, and women, out there who appreciate the fathering you did for them.<\/p>\n

If you, my gentle readers, have a \u201cfather\u201d you wish to thank, go ahead and thank them. You can do it by email, \u2018classic mail\u2019 (no \u2018snail mail\u2019 in the son of a letter carrier\u2019s blog), or write a comment below and point them to this blog post.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Recognizing all the \u2018fathers\u2019 in our lives. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1136,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,39,80],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1829","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-general","category-peace","category-trampleasures"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/trampleasure.net\/lee\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/07\/Horseshoe-game-playing.png","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/trampleasure.net\/lee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1829","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/trampleasure.net\/lee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/trampleasure.net\/lee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/trampleasure.net\/lee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/trampleasure.net\/lee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1829"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/trampleasure.net\/lee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1829\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/trampleasure.net\/lee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1136"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/trampleasure.net\/lee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1829"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/trampleasure.net\/lee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1829"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/trampleasure.net\/lee\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1829"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}