yelling

Loving my son, building my son, touching my son, playing with my son, being with my son_ these aren__ tasks that only super dads can perform. These are tasks that every dad should perform. Always. Without fail.

Dads. Do your faces light up when you first see your child in the morning or when you come home from work? Do you not understand that a child__ entire sense of value can revolve around what they see in your face when you first see them?

Do you not realize that your kids are going to make mistakes, and a lot of them? Do you not realize the damage you do when you push your son__ nose into his mishaps or make your daughter feel worthless because she bumped or spilled something? Do you have any idea how easy it is to make your child feel abject? It__ as simple as letting out the words, __hy would you do that!?_ or __ow many times have I told you_

Dads. Do you not realize that a child is what you tell them they are? That people almost always become what they are labeled? Was whatever your child just did really the __umbest thing you__e ever seen somebody do_? Was it really the __ost ridiculous thing they ever could have done_? Do you really believe that your child is an idiot? Because she now does. Think about that. Because you said it, she now believes it. Bravo.

Dads. It__ time to tell our kids that we love them. Constantly. It__ time to show our kids that we love them. Constantly. It__ time to take joy in their twenty-thousand daily questions and their inability to do things as quickly as we__ like. It__ time to take joy in their quirks and their ticks. It__ time to take joy in their facial expressions and their mispronounced words. It__ time to take joy in everything that our kids are.

Children are gifts. They are not ours for the breaking. They are ours for the making.

Dads. It__ time to show our sons how to properly treat a woman. It__ time to show our daughters how a girl should expect be treated. It__ time to show forgiveness and compassion. It__ time to show our children empathy. It__ time to break social norms and teach a healthier way of life! It__ time to teach good gender roles and to ditch the unnecessary ones. Does it really matter if your son likes the color pink? Is it going to hurt anybody? Do you not see the damage it inflicts to tell a boy that there is something wrong with him because he likes a certain color? Do we not see the damage we do in labeling our girls __om boys_ or our boys __eminine_ just because they have their own likes and opinions on things? Things that really don__ matter?

No one else __akes_ us do anything. They can__ make us nag them, or make us angry, or make us have to strike out at them, or make us drink alcohol, or make us yell at them, or anything else. We are responsible for our choices, including our responses and reactions.

It is the nature of physics to hear the loudest of mouths over the most comprehensive ones.

I am far from a perfect dad. And I always will be. But I__ a damn good dad, and my son will always feel bigger than anything life can throw at him. Why? Because I get it. I get the power a dad has in a child__ life, and in a child__ level of self-belief. I get that everything I ever do and ever say to my son will be absorbed, for good or for bad.

Dads. Do you honestly expect anybody to believe that you can__ find 20 minutes to step away from your computer or turn off the television to play with your child? It has to happen every single day. Do you not understand that children will hinge their entire facet of trust on whether or not their dad plays with them and how involved he is when he plays with them? Do you know the damage you do by not playing with your children every day?

Do we not see the influence we have when we say we believe in one thing, but our children see us living something else? Do we not realize how little we encourage our children to actually decide what they believe, declare what they believe, and then live by it? Whether it__ religion, politics, sports, or societal norms. It is not our place to tell our kids what to think. It is our place to teach our kids to think correctly. If we do this, we need have no fear of what they will decide for themselves and how strongly they__l stand behind it. A man will follow his own convictions to his death, but he__l only follow another man__ convictions until he steps in manure.

Dads. Do you not realize that your child needs to feel your skin on his? Do you not realize the incredible and powerful bond that skin on skin contact with your daughter will give you? Do you not understand the permanent mental connections that are made when you stroke your son__ bare back or rub your daughter__ bare tummy while you tell bedtime stories? And if any idiot says anything about that being inappropriate, you__e gonna get kicked in the face, first by me, and then by every other good dad out there. Touching your child is your duty as a father.

Goddamn it, Joanna!' Claire called. After twelve years her voice was sharper than Jo remembered. 'I know you're standing on the stairs,' she said. 'I can see you. Get down here and help me!

I was also sick of my neighbors, as most Parisians are. I now knew every second of the morning routine of the family upstairs. At 7:00 am alarm goes off, boom, Madame gets out of bed, puts on her deep-sea divers_ boots, and stomps across my ceiling to megaphone the kids awake. The kids drop bags of cannonballs onto the floor, then, apparently dragging several sledgehammers each, stampede into the kitchen. They grab their chunks of baguette and go and sit in front of the TV, which is always showing a cartoon about people who do nothing but scream at each other and explode. Every minute, one of the kids cartwheels (while bouncing cannonballs) back into the kitchen for seconds, then returns (bringing with it a family of excitable kangaroos) to the TV. Meanwhile the toilet is flushed, on average, fifty times per drop of urine expelled. Finally, there is a ten-minute period of intensive yelling, and at 8:15 on the dot they all howl and crash their way out of the apartment to school._ (p.137)

...yelling doesn't make a thing any more possible.

If someone yells at me, they are not expressing love. They may be threatening me. They may be expressing great frustration with me. They may simply be trying to control my behavior. However, they are not communicating love.

Some people believe that if they yell and scream, others will get the point of just how serious they are. For me, all I get is the point of just how out of control that someone is.