Time Warp

So there I was, lying on my back under the kitchen sink, coaxing loose the old faucet so I could replace it with the new one. Not the toughest bit of DIY in the world, sure, but it still technically qualifies as plumbing, so getting it done brings about a level of job satisfaction at least a few steps above a successful light bulb replacement. Not to mention the wife’s adoration.

Wrench in hand, flashlight pinned between my head and the back wall of the cabinet to illuminate the object of my labor, I heard the sound of small feet approaching. The baby had already paid a visit, but now the three year old’s curiosity drew him my way. He asked what I was doing and I started to tell him, but as I spoke, I started to feel the strangest sensations. I looked up to where my little boy was standing and I could see everything in my field of vision changing. The color in the room faded to black and white, then went all grainy technicolor on me. My little boy’s shorts, tee-shirt, and bare feet were replaced with a little coonskin cap, short pants, and cowboy boots. My cut off camo shorts morphed into pleated khakis, my tee-shirt into a button-up plaid number that tucked itself right into the pants, and while I didn’t look in a mirror, I swear I could feel pomade shaping my hair into a nice respectable do, perfectly parted on the right. Off in my den, the dogs discussed who was to bring my pipe and who was to bring my slippers.

With changes like that, I don’t even want to think about what happened to our T.V.

Moments like that happen every now and then. I’ll realize I’m doing something with my boys that seems so Dadesque, so classically Pops, that I feel like I’m fulfilling the role of some archetypal father figure. And I mean that in the positive sense, not in the dark sense of the angry man in the wife-beater that the whole house is afraid of, or the stoic uninvolved fellow who can’t be bothered to change a diaper. Like in this case, I was the father with the tools and the bit of know-how, patiently explaining his actions to the boy at his feet. It’s a strange, comforting, satisfying feeling. There’s a mantle of fatherhood, and I’m helping to carry it.

Does this happen to other people? It’s a question for Moms and Dads both. Do you ever find yourself living up to the image of the parent that you carry around with you, be it in ways large or small? Myself, I was raised by a single mom, so the images of “Dad” that I carry around with me are scattered and various. Sitcom dads, friends’ dads, scoutmasters, coaches, these were the father figures I had growing up, the guys who formed my idea of how a man who is a dad should and, in some cases, should not be. Maybe it’s because I grew up that way that I crave moments like these. It’s like a chance to get back that father-son relationship, albeit from the other side of things.

I finished hooking up the new faucet and turned it on. The boy watched the water come out and beamed as if he’d done the job himself.