I am not a huge fan of Dr. Laura but she does come on one of the radio stations I listen to and today she made a comment that prompted some thinking for me. One of her callers was asking how to resolve an issue she was having with her 17 year old son.
At the time her son was born the caller was, in her own words, ‘not exactly the most responsible person’ and the father was no better. He had pretty much abandoned her and the child the moment he learned of the pregnancy. Luckily she had married a good man and he had raised the child. The caller wasn’t sure if she should let her son know that he had ‘another dad’ out there.
Dr. Laura responded with a simple comment…. Dad is a verb not a noun. Her point being that the man who had raised the child, who had been responsible and caring for the child, the one who had always been part of the child’s like, that was the father, not just some guy who happened to donate sperm.
I couldn’t help pondering this comment when thinking of the various stories we’ve seen splashed across the news over the past year. Balloon boy, John and Kate, the Octomom, and so on. The kind of people who subject their children to a miserable childhood just for a few bucks.
Or we could consider the parents we all know in our own lives. The ones who seem more concerned about whether or not Billy makes the team or Sally wins the beauty contest than if the children are happy. The ones who seem to want a trophy to bring out when company is around but want to hang them up on the wall or stick them in a closet when it’s time to go to a party or take a trip somewhere.
Perhaps it is time that everyone remember that the terms Mom and Dad are indeed verbs, not nouns. The world might be a better place if they did.