Me and My Dad
Being a daddy's girl, a father is someone who I can ask for anything for. My simple mind back then would tell me that if I need anything, all I have to do is to ask my dad for it. For me at that time, the most dominant role that my dad plays is the role of the providing father. And if you'd ask everyone, that would be the first one that would pop out of everyone's mind. It's not a shock since that's the traditional role of fathers. But this is not the case today. According to American Psychological Association, the role and status of the fathers around the world now are more complicated than being just a father.
According to the said association, there are different kinds of fathers today. There are the non-residential fathers, divorced, step fathers, gay fathers and stay-at-home fathers. These different kinds of fathers crop out because of different factors. One of the said factors is women empowerment. But this is not to say that women empowerment is something bad. On the other hand, this brought about positive changes in the society. But everything has its good and bad products and this may be considered as one of those bad products. Another factor which lead to the sprouting of the different kinds of fathers is the usual tendency of the fathers to be distant to their families. With that being said, it doesn't matter if it is hard for the fathers to have time with their children. They should try as much as possible to be always visible.
In the past, fathers are known to be the breadwinners and mothers would usually stay at home but this is not the case today. More mothers now are working and there are also some fathers now who stay at home. This change is brought about by different factors. One factor which lead to this shifting is women empowerment. With the society's equal treatment to both sexes, women are able to explore more opportunities that are out there for them. Another factor is the existence of marriage related laws which are annulment and divorce.
All my life, I've always thought the mothers have the upper hand in terms of importance in raising a kid. People would normally say that it is better for the mother to be left behind and that all the kids need from their fathers is the father figure and discipline which can also be given by mothers. But this is really not the case. Losing my own father at the age of 13 also has its ups and downs. The good thing about my dad is that before he died, he never faltered to show us his love, respect and support in all the positive aspects in our life. This may have been the reason why we aren't really lacking when it comes to social, emotional and cognitive aspects. The downside however aside from the financial instability is my own sense of place in the world. In all honesty, I may not be lacking in terms of the other aspects but when it comes with my own place in this world, I get confused as hell. Asking me the question "What do you really want to do?" would get me crawling somewhere to hide just to avoid answering that question. That is one thing that I would want to get over with. The real question is, how?
I got to know a lot of these things because of the lecture of Noel Tan at Greenbelt last January 8, 2012 along with the movie I watched entitled Courageous the next day after the lecture. I never even expected that the movie was related to the lecture I attended the other day but maybe this is God's sign of telling me to move forward and to not be afraid to know my place in the world.
DISCLAIMER: I do not own the photos that can be found in this blog.
