speak softly….

(Note: this post is sponsored by MomCentral.)

When I received the call to review Crawling: A Father’s First Year I jumped at the chance. Why? Primarily because of the dearth of books written by dads about parenting. Sure, you can get The Father’s Almanac or The Expectant Father, both great “how to’s” for the men in your life who have, say, never changed a diaper. Cooper hiimself fingers the issue of representations of fatherhood by writing:

Mothers have issues–a balance of care and work and expectations more complex and difficult than anything men have–but father’s don’t have issues. We have stereotypes. We’re either bare-chested and holding a naked baby, throwing a ball on a sunny field with the child as we get older. Or we’re potbellied and holding a beer, yelling at the child during a little league game with beatings and abandonment and years of therapy to follow.

Suffice it to say that in this kind little book, Cooper dispells his own fatherhood stereotypes. The stories he tells from the trenches of fatherhood are funny, endearing and lovely.  We watch as he comes up against his limitations, his fear of change, his worry about his daughter’s future, his fumbling over childcare and eating out.  And yet, just as he manages to balance a cup of coffee, muffin and newspaper all while holding Zoe in a baby carrier, Cooper also proves to the reader that he is a master juggler of all things fatherhood.

Throughout these stories of Cooper’s first year of parenthood (which include delightful drawings by the author), a new person emerges, an artist who shares his love of paint and water color with his child, a father who discovers who his daughter is and what she likes, a man who exposes his child to the things that thrill her, like a local zoo or fast bike rides through the neighborhood.  One of my favorite scenes comes at a local playground, in a G-rated version of a scene straight out of Little Children.  Cooper, the sole dad at the playground, is challenged by the behavior of some little boys.  He struggles with the notion of whether he should defend his daughter, or call the moms on their sons’ behavior. Finally, with some direction from his wife, he sits in front of little Zoe and says,

“If you want to share your ball with him you can. But if he grabs it say, ‘No!’” Then I added something that Elise and I had not discussed.  “And if he pushes you, kick him there,” I said, point at his shins.  I was distinguishing myself as a parent after all.

Cooper’s story ends with a climactic, though happy ending. And when we reach the end, we know, as does he, that “I am her father, nothing more, nothing less.”

I’d love to share this book with fellow readers. Leave me a comment and I’ll pick one of you to get a copy of “Crawling” sent to your snail mail.