Dodgeball and other musings

So, this weekend my church's college class had it's first annual Dodgeball Tourney.

Now, to be more accurate, my church's college class is more a "college-age class". Churches are notorious for not producing a whole lot of college students, and to have a college class only composed of college students would be problematic. Besides, churches are also notorious for just sort of dropping kids after they get out of high school. You have classes for everyone from 2 years to high school, college, married couples, old farts. Everyone. But the non-married 25 year old can have some trouble finding a place if they want an age-specific activity at church, and the college class in many churches has become that kind of squishy middle ground.

So, anyway, I spent Saturday morning officiating as people ranging from 19 to 30 were throwing balls at eachother. I have to say, it was beautiful to see the youth being recaptured.

So I guess I expect my blogue to mostly be a place for funny writing. However, during our college class (if you're wondering why I'm there, not being college-aged and being married and all, it's because I'm one of the staff) there was a discussion about fathers, and it got me thinking about mine.

I was born many, many (but not too, too many) years ago in Minnesota. Legend has it that I was conceived on my mother's birthday in International Falls, MN, and in keeping with the legend I was born nine months later in frosty Minneapolis.

My mom and my father had a lovely affair. They met in college at Luther in Decorah, IA. My mom remembers first seeing my father as he streaked the campus in an alcohol-induced frenzy on Halloween. Strangely, it was that experience that quickly drew her to him.

They both left college after two years and got hitched, moving to my father's home state of Minnesota. After two years, they had me. Two years after that, they got divorced. My father was an alcoholic, and a surly one at that. My mother has told two particularly frightening stories, one involving my dad throwing an iron at her head (and, fortunately, being too drunk to hit her) and one involving him holding her at gunpoint with a shotgun.

My mom moved us back out here to Oregon, and I saw my father for the occasional summer or Christmas. My mom re-married twice. Both men had their strengths and their weaknesses, but neither was really able to assume the mantle of fatherhood and neither lasted.

My dad did end up moving out here to Oregon when I was in fifth grade. That was one of the happiest times of my life. I got a ride with one of my adopted male role models, Richard, who was on his way to Chicago with his nephew for a fun road trip and who thought it would be fun to take me along (Chicago being relatively close to St. Paul when you consider that it's all really, really far from PDX). That was a fun trip. On the way back east, we saw the Oregon Caves, the redwood forests, the Dinosaur National Monument, and Richard's old uncle in Iowa who walked around naked at night, even when he had guests. Once in Minnesota, I spent a week with dad as he finished preparing to move, then my mom flew out and we all rode back to Oregon along a more norther route, stopping at Mt. Rushmore, Yellowstone, Wall Drug, and any other tourist destinations that readily presented themselves.

What followed were 6 of the better years in my life. My dad was in town, alcohol free (almost 'til the end), and available when I needed him. I spent every other weekend with him and we had a lot of fun.

He died when I was a junior in high school, though, and I was back to being fatherless.

Now, I'm not going to engage in any grand social theorizing. However, it is interesting to see how the lack of fathers (who are generally the absentee parent in most households) is affecting our society today. I think that it actually started farther back when you had absentee fathers in the same house. Last night the discussion dwelt on how The Depression affected our fathers' fathers. I don't know that I necessarily agree with the speaker's assertion that it made them want to make sure that their sons (our fathers) didn't have to go through the same thing. What I really think is that The Depression started the rift in families, because our fathers' fathers had to be home less and working harder to support their families, and in that unavailability they were the first generation that broke down in terms of providing the example of being there for your child. Our fathers didn't have fathers to learn how to be men from, to be husbands from, to be fathers from because their fathers were forced to work so hard to support their families. So when our fathers became husbands and fathers, they didn't know how to do it, and divorce started to rise, and homes started to break up, and boys stopped having available models of how to become men.

That's my theory, anyway. I think I'm somewhat correct. All of my mom's husbands had fathers who went through the depression, and none of them seemed comfortable spending time with their sons. I never sensed that my father, as fun as he was to be around, really had a handle on what being a dad meant. And I feel like my life is worse for that.

I don't have any point in all of this, except to write a bit and to reminisce. I should have warned you of that at the beginning. Sorry. My next post will be more chipper.

If you're one that notes the times I post, you'll see I should be at work. However, if you know my particular job, you'll remember that on Mondays, I don't have to be there until 9:00. So shut up.

This is one of those columns where your opinions would be interesting to me. If you write something (use the link below) I'll post it (unless you want it to be private) using your own handy-dandy code name to protect your identity (if you'd like).

Anyway, need to go. Work starts soon. Until we meet again,

Catch ya later.