This morning I was dozing when I literally sat up in bed and thought, "My God, I didn't call my dad yesterday!" Fortunately it's next Sunday. Unfortunately I will not actually experience Sunday, June 18 at all, because I'm going to Australia and that's the day I lose when I cross the International Date Line. Not that that should keep me from sending him a card.
really, who fishes these days?)
me, for one and I'm certainly looking forward to going fishing wiv my little lad next week.
It is a shame. I think the explanation is less anti-father hostility, and more that sappy sentimentality is percieved as deeply unmanly these days, and so all the cards are going to be funny/mean. I should make brunch reservations for Buck and the kids.
I'm looking forward to Father's Day in a small way and hoping in a small way that nobody gives me any store-bought greetings cards. (My odds are fairly good; Sylvia will probably give me a drawing of some sort, and Ellen a book or a dinner.) All my life I have disliked the greeting cards -- they just seem lame. Even the very occasional funny one, so what? It's not a joke the person is telling you or that they came up with. I'd much rather be given a note on a blank card or one with a picture on it.
Becks, I'm with you, and also -- don't greeting cards just generally suck? If the recipient of your card isn't religious, elderly, or lame, it's really difficult to find even a birthday card.
"Dad as dolt" humor has very deep roots in American culture; many, although not all sitcoms are based on this.
I think Constance Rourke had something to say about it.
The obvious first approximation to squaring this with Patriarchy is that comedy always inverts: the servants and women run things, are smarter, etc. It works because of the tension between the inversion and the fact that there's a lot of truth in the inversion, whatever our values.
Don't have to be Dan Quayle to be annoyed about this, either; scroll down to "doofus men" in this cache from Pandagon's incomparably craptacular archives.
Which is pretty much implicit in 3; if actual feeling is perceived as unmanly, that's not going to be good for men or women.
Er, ah, I meant "TMW" and "TMY".
TMK, I'm entirely with you. Store-bought "message" cards are lame. It's marginally okay if you actually write a note on the inside flap, but only just. I'd rather get an "hi there" index card and a cup of coffee for the same price.
[/cranky, reflexive cheapskate]
I usually just buy the blank ones with a photograph on the front.
I am moving now towards printing my own from negatives (I have a crappy but functional 1950s-made photographic enlarger).
I'm not sure that a "Dan Quayle moment" is all that called for btw; in my house at least, it is a source of complete joy when the little lad realises that Daddy has got something wrong or is pretending not to understand (for example) that there wasn't any nursery today. Shouting "Silly Daddy!" when we all know we're playing a game is an implict recognition that Daddy isn't silly.
Whew, thanks for the reminder.
It's not just that sappy sentimentality is unmanly (ask Harvey); commercial cards tend to fall into one of two categories: "funny" (meaning mean), or "sincere" (meaning sentimental in a really bad way). Or just crappy. This is why I write letters.
Store-bought cards are only once in a blue moon cool. I actually got two awesome cards for my birthday last, but that's only because my best friends know my taste exactly.
I never buy any greeting cards, and if pressed, I go for the blank ones.
Yeah, I only buy cards at Kate's these days. Though Barnes and Noble has some pretty good blank ones as well.
My son is taking me to the zoo. And my wife is taking me out to dinner. I never in a million years would have thought that this was a weekend that I would look forward to for weeks. Perhaps because my own father got a hunted look in his eyes each year on the occasion.
Re 11, My son is very aware that, six months ago, we were counting how many times a church bell rang on Sunday morning, and I got it wrong. Most times when we hear a bell, he smiles and says "Daddy made a mistake!" in an awed and gleeful voice.
As for the cards, I think they are not quite an effort by the partiarchy to lower expectations (although that fits the facts) so much as they are a complete example of the condescencion of corporate America towards the American family.
Okay, I am perplexed by this "daddy is wrong!" glee. Is there a "mommy is wrong!" glee thing, too? I have never experienced this; explain!
Okay, I am perplexed by this "daddy is wrong!" glee. Is there a "mommy is wrong!" glee thing, too? I have never experienced this; explain!
Okay, I am perplexed by this "daddy is wrong!" glee. Is there a "mommy is wrong!" glee thing, too? I have never experienced this; explain!
Why the fuck did my comment post three times? I only hit post once.
Perplexed in triplicate, yet! TMY thinks it's pretty funny when either of her parents slips up, she keeps her ears open for it to happen. Possibly with me more than with TMW, I'm not sure. I don't really get quite why, but if it means she is paying attention then it seems like a good thing.
Did you refresh the comment thread, looking for responses? That's what has caused me to do that.
The kitty tells me my comment has posted; trust in the kitty.
Wow a triple post.
It may be oedipal rivalry. Although I think that more explains why Mom is immune to this because it exhibits itself more broadly than just with me.
When we are reading books and characters make mistakes or have small misfortunes befall them he is similarly gleeful. (The cats who lost their mittens and have no pie make him happy). And he loves to play games in which he is able to hide something of mine and then I pretend to be upset because I lost it. In fact, his joy at the misfortune of fictional characters and pretend anguish of his father would be quite jarring if not balanced by an equally deep sense of compassion that pops up just as often. I think it has to do with the idea that he isn't the only one on the receiving end of life's little misfortunes and that he isn't completely powerless.
This is what happens when there aren't any sentimental cards. All "humorous" cards are based on cliche, because they want to sell more than 10 copies of them, and they're selling them to people who are buying based on the cards' compatibility with familiar social norms.
Mother's Day cards generally fall within one of only two themes:
A) This card is beautiful
B) We kids sure were a handful! And now I realize how patient you were.
It seems like "Father's Day" cards are more similar to "Birthday Cards specifically for men" than "Mother's Day" cards are to "Birthday cards for women".
Birthday cards for men basically consist of the themes listed in this post, plus one theme that people don't want to think about when thinking about their fathers:
*Guys love boobs
Whereas birthday cards for women generally don't fit either of the themes I listed above. Their themes seem to be:
* We've known each other a long time, you and I
* Men are idiots
* You're getting old, but so is everyone else
* It's the one day of the year you can eat dessert!
Did you refresh the comment thread, looking for responses?
Yeah. Huh.
Chris Rock has analyzed this issue in depth: at least dads get the big piece of chicken.
What I think is new recently is that women's b-day cards often feature male cheescake.
All my life I have disliked the greeting cards -- they just seem lame.
Agree entirely and unabashedly. Moreover, Father's Day irritates me. It just seems like scheduled appreciation, and partakes of the same problem that infects the greeting cards--canned sentiment.
Agree with 28. I don't like any of those "role" holidays. I think we should stick to appreciating people on their birthdays, which are specific to them and not in line with a role they play.
But maybe I'd feel differently if I had kids.
27: I believe that is called "beefcake".
All cards suck. 'For you, Daughter.' WTF. Does anyone call me 'Daughter'? And who thought that swirly gold cursive was pretty?
I don't mind Mother's Day -- but it's more fun to surprise my mom with flowers on a whim. Father's Day is pretty useless as a holiday. There's no simple gift unless your dad golfs or fishes, in which case you can find plenty of useless trinkets for $19.99, and all of the cards are just as Becks said.
There's no simple gift unless your dad golfs or fishes
Neckties are popular; also low-quality portable power tools.
I always get flowers and they are always very much appreciated.
Here is the song Mormon children sing in church on Father's Day:
I'm so glad when daddy comes home,
Glad as I can be!
Something something, tum tee tum,
And climb up on his knee!
Put my arms around his neck,
Hold him tight like this,
Grasp his cheeks and give him what?
A great big kiss!
For Mother's day, there's some very unmemorable "Mother I love you for being so angelic" songs, and every woman over, say, 25 gets a rose.
I've got a ton of neckties, and I am picky about buying them. Flowers are nice. I think lots of guys would like flowers and brunch.
I wonder about the cards. Most cards are purchased by women and the designers know that. I wonder if most Father's day's cards are bought by women (for themselves, for their kids). Are the "funny" cards a safe way to express some hostility?
I once saw a card line that said, "Congratulations on Your New Mortgage," which I thought was a significant milemarker both for capitalism and social relations.
Not Father's Day, but this card captures a holiday spirit.
My favorite Mormon mother-related song goes as follows:
When I grow up, I want to be a mother
And have a family
One little, two little, three little babies of my own
Of all the jobs for me
I'll choose no other
I'll have a family
One little, etc.
(second verse)
When I grow up, I want to be a mother
And have a family
Four little, five little, six little babies of my own..
Agh.
Re 31: Digital cameras are always nice. So is alcohol.
So is alcohol.
Thank you. I have just figured out what Buck needs -- Margarita fixings. For some reason we never have both tequila and Cointreau in the house at the same time.
But as an officer of the court, you can't help your kids with the fake ID, can you?
Oh, I think I sang that horror once. I really was spared most of the worst in Mormon culture.
41 - I was at the liquor store the other day and they had a display of flavored salts and sugars next to the tequila with a big sign that said SPECIALTY RIMMERS.
SPECIALTY RIMMERS
This suggests another sort of Father's Day present entirely...
(really, who fishes these days?)
Fly fishing. One of the benefits of living in Utah is easy access to good fly fishing. Those of you who bait fish need to get your shit together and take it to the next level.
I see people fishing in the Hudson River off Harlem all the time. It freaks me out; have they not been reading those news reports about all the toxic dumping upstream? Don't eat fish out of the Hudson, people!
44: We have, at home, a canister of Citrus Rimming Sugar. From Crate and Barrel no less.
44, 48: So little respect for your elders.
So little respect for your elders.
Funny you should say. Respect for one's elders is a major theme of Coleridge's Rim of the Ancient Mariner.
50: You have that title wrong. It's Rim of the Ancient Seaman.
So little respect for your elders.
You do use fresh lime juice in those, don't you w-lfs-n?
Answer truthfully, I'll still love you either way.
I just won't let you make the margaritas if you don't use the fresh.
16: It's kind of basic in American culture that dad's relationship with the kids is more playmate/jovial/teasing than mom's--I think LB kind of explains why in #3, although there is certainly room for the manly "I'm so proud of you" moment.
I've thought about this, though, b/c PK and I tease a lot more than PK and Mr. B. do, and things like "bad Mama!" and "ugly Mama!"--both, along with "ugly child!" and "terrible child!" are said gleefully--are very much part of how we interact. But I think that's pretty unusual.
You do use fresh lime juice in those, don't you w-lfs-n?
Do you take me for a savage, sir?
Do you take me for a savage, sir?
Evasive answer.
I knew it!
I'll bet Michael uses that asscrap in the lime-shaped plastic little squeezetoy thing.
bah to the ever-present margarita. In my mojitos, though, I do use fresh lime juice from organic, locally-raised limes which I buy from yeoman farmers at the weekly farmers' market. (to which I bike, not drive.)
I bet the sugar you use in them is from slave plantations though.
Michael's bike is made totally out of hemp.
well, yes, but the slaves are all children, and happy for any employment they can find.
The sticker on my seat reads "smoke my spoke."
Do you have any stickers on your bike?
There's low-hanging fruit, and then there's picking it up off the ground.
Michael. Please. You mean "There's low-hanging fruit, and then there's the fruit that's lying on the ground.", or "There's picking low-hanging fruit, and then there's picking fruit up off the ground.", but what you said was monstrous. A monstrosity.
Ben -- parallel construction can be taken too far. There is a place for minor disagreements in structure of parallel clauses, indeed such disagreement can read better than a truly parallel structure. Michael's 84 is more fluent than either of your proposed alternatives.
Well, whip me for an albino. Right you are, Ben.
Michael's 84 is more fluent than either of your proposed alternatives.
"64", and I'm well aware. But is fluency purchased at the cost of artistry really worth it? I grant that my more formally correct proposals were stiff and clunky, but I'm sure a fluent alternative could be formulated that didn't bow to the genius temporis of laxity in all things—and such a construction would be much more deserving of our esteem.
Ach! I agreed with the opposition before noting I had a defender! I think the second option presented by w-lfs-n would flow alright if you replaced the second mention of "fruit" with a pronoun. But TMK makes a valid point; while not technically accurate, you grasped the concept being offered up.
Woo-hoo! Support from the groves of academe!
