Park Dads

Watching fathers at the park up the street from my house is funny as hell. They are always so self-conscious and awkward with their children. I find this really surprising because on average, they are or were married to the mothers and have been involved with these children all of their lives. When I lived in the hood a lot of the dads weren't married to the moms nor had they ever been, and many didn't see their children on a frequent or consistent basis. But they seemed more at ease with their children at a park or something and vice versa than the fathers out here. I wonder why that is.

So the boys and I were at the park yesterday. They were running around playing with the other kids, I was watching them from a park table. Brian had taken Iyende to her boating class, so we had to get out of the house. I do not stay alone with my boys at home if I can help it, they start running around and tearing stuff up and jumping on me and stuff. When I am with them by myself it often seems like they turn into 10 little boys, they are so active. If I don't have Brian around for crowd control we hit the park, go somewhere. I played with them for a bit and then sat down because I am 30, not 6, my energy level is a bit lower than theirs. I scanned the parents sitting about, nobody I knew was there, and the rest as usual avoided my eyes. Lots of snotty folk where I live, some wouldn't speak to save their lives. I said hello anyway, cause I'm cool like that.

There were several dads there. It was a trip watching them because they all talked in a loud voice and followed around their kids, much to the kids annoyance. The jungle gym part of the park is this huge wooden castle affair, complete with slides and little flags at the top, it is child size in dimension. Anyone under 12, 13 would have difficulty navigating around in it. Most of the parents will watch their kids from a bench rather than try to follow them through, but not the hover-dads.

And why do they always make a bee-line for me? Since most of these dads are white (I hate to be paranoid about this, but) I can't help but feel that it's because I'm black. Like, you know, since I'm a black mom I'm on the outs with most of the white moms (which is often true) and won't be too harsh on their parenting skills....hmmmmm. And of course another part of me thinks they think they can pick me up or something. I get the impression that a lot of white moms here think that. I'm sitting there, minding my own business, when a dad comes up to me and says hello, we chit-chat about kids for a minute, and he goes on to follow his kid around some more. I look up to see a white mama glaring at me with her arms crossed, and then say to the dad while he passes, "How is your wife doing?" as if I didn't know he was married by the ring or as if I CARED. I started to tell her, Look bee-yotch, I am married myself matter of fact got my own white man at home who is young and cute, you don't need to worry about me scrounging off of any of your old bald raggedy husbands. But I figured that would sound and be really ignorant so I didn't. The thought of doing so made me chuckle, though.

I rarely see dads Brian's age out here, that's another difference from the dads in the hood. When I do see a dad in his late twenties he usually has a little baby or toddler, and almost always the mother is there with them.