Happy Dad's Day: A Tribute to Non-biological Fathers

“Happy Fathers Day to the Best Dad in the World.” I smile as I open the card and read the cute punch line. The bright, inquisitive eyes of my children seem to expect praise for their mother’s thoughtfulness. “Thank you Bob and Tilly,” I say, using that slow deliberate manner in which one speaks to a two-year old. I pet their heads, scratch behind their ears and set a bowlful of food on the ground for each of them.

Don’t call children’s services. My “children” are my cats, and every year my wife buys me a Fathers Day card from them, helping fill the yearly void. My wife and I cannot have children due to biological reasons. Since we are not independently wealthy, we cannot adopt.

Thus we, like many other couples, simply plod onwards, dealing with the absence in our hearts. One of the best bandages I know is a reminder that not every father is truly a “Dad.”

A father is the name on the birth certificate. Dad is the name the child calls just before the villain from the movie he was not supposed to watch breaks through the window in his nightmare to hurt him.

A father pays money to support his child. Dad takes the children out back and throws a ball to them until his arm falls off – or until the grounder pops up and hits his son quite uncomfortably.

A father may even write his children letters. But Dad holds his daughter after Mr. Single-Digit-IQ dumps her. And Dad never says, though he is thinking, “I told you so.”

I may never be a father, and I know I’m not the only one. But all of us men can be Dads in one form or another. So here is a “Happy Dads Day” to the unique Dads out there.