Previously Known As Chopperpapa.com

Our fathers sinned, and are no more; it is we who have borne their iniquities . Lamentations 5:7 “Dad? Am I a good person?”  “I think so, I know so, yes.”  “Will – will that help me when things get really rough?”  “It’ll help.”  “That’s not good enough, Dad.”  “Good is no guarantee for your body. It’s mainly peace of mind --- “But sometimes, Dad, aren’t you so scared that even --- “---the mind isn’t peaceful?” His father nodded, his face uneasy.  “Dad’, said Will, his voice uneasy. “Are you a good person?”  “To you and your mother, yes, I try. But no man’s a hero to himself. I’ve lived with me a lifetime. I know everything worth knowing about myself---” “And, adding it up…?   “The sum? As they come and go, and I mostly sit very still and tight, yes, I’m all right.”  “Then Dad,” asked Will, ‘why aren’t you happy?”  “The front lawn…let’s see… at one thirty in the morning…is no place to start a philosophical…”  “I just wanted to know is all.”  Something Wicked This Way Comes  I haven’t fo

A recent and passionate email from a reader reminded me of the enormous confusion that exists, predominately among men, about the definition of ‘daddy’. The email, too long for reciting here, is from a father, living in the US, who has two children abroad. He and the mother met in the states. Soon she became pregnant and not long after, for reasons unknown, moved back to her native country, only to discover after touching down that she was pregnant with their second child. Unsurprisingly, the relationship didn’t last, and the children have remained with her, on another continent, ever since. The father still resides here in the US. According to the email, he visits the children when he can but hasn’t seen them in two years.  This father’s anger, however, isn’t that he’s missing out on their childhood. It isn’t that he’s riddled with guilt a world away or that he doesn’t have the slightest knowledge of who his children really are. His frustration is far more involved, but ultimately und

Many years ago, in another life long before the Queen, I met a woman during a business conference. She was blessed with hazel eyes that could bring any man to his knees. Introduced through a mutual colleague, we got to know each other between breakout sessions and cocktail hours.  We stayed in touch and what started as two professional thirty something’s enjoying time as schedules permitted grew into a 300-mile long-distance relationship. Ignited by those first days in Memphis, our relationship was now fueled on long phone conversations and short weekend visits. From the beginning, things felt right. Divorced only six months, I already had a few failed ‘relationships’ in my rearview mirror, but this one, I believed, was different. She always said - and I always did -  the right things. We were made for each other, and both knew something more than coincidence had happened.     Everything seemed perfect when together. The conversation easy, the passion intense. I believed no one underst

In the aftershock of her announcement to end our marriage, one thought immediately pressed upon me; what is this going to do to our children? I wasn’t so interested in the why as I was the what. One child was six months the other just over 2.5 years. I knew they couldn’t grasp what was going on, even though she sat them down and comically explained that mommy and daddy were no longer going to live together.  Their reaction fell somewhere between Barney the Dinosaur distraction and drool.  The shame subsided only during happy hours and furniture shopping. I looked into their faces and saw my failure glaring back. I kept wondering how would I explain this to them in the years to come, and what does fatherhood look like when you are only doing it part-time? My therapist reminded me that kids were resilient and quality was more important than quantity. I wanted to believe him but knew it wasn’t that simple.  I was hurting, vulnerable, and it would have been easy to leave it all behind; the

  My friend Tara, from Relative Evolutions, wrote a recent essay on how marriage is hard work. She ends with this question,  “Marriage is work. So why do we congratulate those who leave a dead-end job while shaming those who leave a dead-end marriage?” It’s an excellent thought and worthy of a response.   ** In several ways, I agree with the creative symbolism she uses to connect work and marriage. She writes:   “First, you have to prove yourself worthy, then you get hired and everyone rejoices because a vacancy has been filled.  There is hope and optimism that the team will move forward and accomplish great things together. You have to show up every day, even when you don't exactly feel like it. You have to use the skills you have as well as learn new ones as you grow. There are changes to roll with, likely in the form of surprise projects and revised deadlines. If all goes well, your work is (mostly) enjoyable and appreciated, and everyone is (mostly) happy.”  It is most certain

  My father never offered his advice about girls, though I understand he was moderately popular with them; and after thirty years of marriage you think he’d have something valuable to say. He never spoke about the secret of his marital success or how to make relationships work. He never shared how a woman’s character and integrity are more important than her personality or the color of her hair. He never counseled me to look through her eyes to what hides behind them, and he didn’t caution that in this world there are ordinary girls and girls of a different kind - or how to tell the difference.  His neglect would plague me for more than twenty years.  My impression of women and relationships, for most of my adult life, can be summarized like this; if she was marginally alcoholic, somewhat trampy, overly desperate, and was just attractive enough to bolster my ego I believe she had sufficient criteria for a girlfriend, and if she stayed faithful maybe even a wife. But I would gladly nego

Buy the truth and sell it not.   Proverbs 23:23 There is a world of difference between a ‘good guy’ and a ‘good man’. One will get you drunk, make you laugh, and if really lucky, help you move. The other will irritate, humble, and inspire you. I know lots of ‘good guys’, I can count on one hand who is a ‘good man’.   Yet it seems the two have become almost synonymous. I am not sure if this is because of confusion or exhaustion. Are we unsure of what is a ‘good man’ because we lack a clear definition, or do we not care to be bothered learning the difference? This is a shame because whether it be superhero notions, a future spouse, or a honest mechanic, there is something in most of us that longs for the ‘good man’.     **   For reasons I do not entirely understand, I am drawn to late 19th century British pastors. Men so utterly obscure today it is amazing I discovered them at all.  And while they are preachers who proudly proclaimed the Gospel in their day, they are also men who clearly

--> When we found out, in 2002, that we were having a son I secretly freaked. Not because I did not necessarily want a son, I could not help visualizing my unborn boy terrorizing girls, racing cars on the backstreets of Atlanta, and trying to burn down his high school gymnasium. I had virtually convinced myself, before he was much bigger than a golf ball, that I would have to send him off to a faraway Draconian style boarding school or a juvenile detention center if I hoped for him to grow up into functioning adult. Fortunately, my anxiety waned after ‘Bubba’ was born and as we celebrate his seventh birthday this weekend, I could not imagine my life now without him in it. ⇹ I think for a lot of dads the thought of raising a son seems almost unnatural. Much of that is because so many of our fathers missed the mark with us. As such, we were not handed down the right road map showing us how to usher our infant sons into manhood. And that is not necessarily our