Heart & Soul of a Single Dad

The very idea of manhood is complex.  If you ask 10 people how they define manhood you may get 10 different answers.  Yet, if you ask those same men about their journey even though the actual steps may be different there will be common threads.  The commonality is where the opportunity to build lives. Admittedly so there isn’t a manual provided to a parent once a child is born detailing the steps necessary to raise their new bundle of joy.  With that being said all one can do is be the best parent they can be.  In many cases Dad’s draw on the experience of their family structure which provides some structure.  That's if there was a man in the house otherwise it's solely on the job training without the benefit of a previous model.  There are several adaptations to this model, the father/father figure may have had a rough upbringing, there may not be a male figure in the home at all.  This tremendously hinders development on the journe...

Last week I wrote about the frustrations of a man in consideration of the movie “Fences”.  When I began this series of my Fatherhood blog dedicated to digging deeper into the movie my intent was to explore the array of feelings that arose inside of me as I sat in the theater.  As I stated in the first blog this movie took me on the journey from boy to man and eventually father all over again. Troy (Denzel Washington) has 2 sons.  Lyons (Russell Hornsby) who was born out of wedlock before Troy went to prison and Cory (Jovan Adepo) who was born in wedlock and saw Troy in the home on a daily basis.  Lyons once confronted Troy about his absence in his life in the living room of Troy’s home but when the backyard conversation happened when Troy talked about his upbringing it felt as if Lyons came terms with his father as he understood Troy a lot better.  Cory on the other hand had Troy in the home and their relationship was troublesome, to put it mildly. ...