The Dating Dad

I'm talking about blogging with some great people!

Join some thought-provoking bloggers and me as we speak on a panel that will explore the idea of blogging as a form of self-portraiture!

Other participants include:

• John Common, Hit Record and Play
• Eryc Eyl, Westword music writer
• Michelle Lee, In the Kitchen With Bossygirl
• Naomi Zeveloff, The Lady Finger

The panel is part of the Mizel Museum's "My Self" exhibition, which opened May 4.

Details:
When: Monday, June 29, 8:00 pm
Where: Forest Room 5 Restaurant, 2532 15th St., Denver, 80211
Cost: $5

Feel free to RSVP on Facebook!

An Explanation: June, 2009

I’m writing this column on a plane flying from Seattle back to Denver. A cute baby is asleep on the seat next to me, one hand outstretched, the other curved in a ball by her face. When I first sat down, she couldn’t help rubbing my arm; I think she liked the way the soft hair felt. We cooed at each other. Some days, I really want one more little one.

Anyway. I traveled to the Pacific Northwest for a Monday morning meeting with an influential leader — a new client, but a potential mentor as well. But I arrived Friday so that I could explore Seattle and treat myself to an escape. I had no agenda (except to eat my way through the city), and had just one friend who lived in the area (but he’d be out of town). I was prepared to be my own company.

Before I left, I reached out to a Twitter friend (a single mom) who lives in Seattle for some advice about what to see and do. In the course of our emails, we decided to try to grab a drink if her single parenting schedule worked out.

But mostly I’d be on my own. There were times over the weekend when I wished I had someone with whom to share my adventures, like when I was sitting on a dock at Bainbridge Island, sipping at a dirty chai and listening to the rigging from the myriad sailboats in the harbor elicit rhythmic, percussive notes like a ghostly steel drum band, or laying bed after a full day, looking at the photos I’d taken and not having anyone there sharing her photos back. But, mostly, the solo time was good for me. Really good.

So my Twitter pal Stacy reached out to me, and told me that she and another single mom wanted to take me out on the town for a night of Dating Dad-style carousing. They picked me up on Saturday evening, and we found our way to a seafood place for our first stop. What I didn’t realize until halfway through our bucket of steamed clams and first set of cocktails was that Stacy and Jenn were Dating Dad readers. I thought we’d met through Twitter, but the reality was that, for more than a year, Stacy had been recommending my blog to newly divorced parents she met. My stories were meaningful enough to her for her to share them. It was a truly humbling and gratifying moment.

See, it’s one thing to read the comments left at the bottom of a new post—they’re powerful and remind me that I have an audience. But to actually come face to face with, well...fans, was something entirely new. We had such a funny and wonderful evening, the three of us. I’m still smiling about it.

Stacy’s friend Jenn told me that the first column she read was a Peach one, and she immediately thought, “That guy’s a jerk.” (“You’re right,” I said to her. “I was a jerk.”) But then she went back to the beginning, and took a whole morning to read every post. What she recognized, by the end, was that my Dating Dad chronicles are a progression, a process. A narrative.

How long have I been “The Dating Dad”? Years. It started as something I did only for myself — capturing my thoughts and experiences as written words, as a way to process the disorientation, the adventures, the humiliating errors and frustrations I encountered while navigated a landscape rife with the obstacles, potholes, mountains to climb, and vistas I never could have imagined before I was cut loose from the comfort and creative stultification of my domestic enclosure.

When I had a few good columns written, I shared them, cautiously, with writers and journalist friends. Eventually, an editor I knew from SheKnows.com asked if they could publish them on their network of parenting websites. They even offered to pay me for them (when you could still get paid for web content). Agreeing meant that I had to commit to writing a new column each month.

But once I got started, I found that I had many stories to tell. A year or so in, the web publishers got behind on posting my work (and also informed me they could no longer pay). So, after a couple of emails from readers asking why I hadn’t written anything in a couple of months, I decided to start this blog and just publish them myself.

I posted all of my stuff from the past in a single sitting, then started with new content. My first readers were the ones my own mother sent my way. Every month, she’d email a passel of friends and family the link to my latest post. And every month, the audience would grow a little bit. The occasional email would come in, or comment would be posted about how something I had written had resonated with a reader — a single mom or dad traveling along the same path; someone who was also foundering when I was, hoping for love but worried about his or her fitness to be in a relationship again; a loving parent; someone still angry with me for my immature behavior more than a decade and a half ago (you’ll keep writing your anonymous vitriol, and I’ll keep hoping you’ll engage with me in a meaningful way so you can let go of that anger and I can breathe past the guilt that still sneaks in on vulnerable days).

At some point, I had to make a decision about where to take my Dating Dad musings—how could I be true to my experiences and learning, how could I be true to the readers who read my writing because of its candor, while respecting the privacy of the people who had an impact on the stories I wanted to tell?

I gave myself some guidelines:

1. Don’t use real names, except for Simone and me (I sometimes wonder if I should have changed Simone’s name)
2. Try not to write about anything too current if it involves someone else (e.g. don’t write about someone I just went out on a date with)
3. Try to tie my stories to universal concepts, rather than making them a travelogue—make each column more than just another “here’s what I did” narrative.

When I’m on a date with someone who’s read my stuff, the first question is often, “How can you be so public about your life?” For some, the fact that I have this blog is a deal-breaker. For others, the fact that I’m open with my struggles and that I so obviously strive to be a good father seems like a promise.

The answer isn’t complicated. I’m compelled to share my successes and failures as a parent who’s hoping for his next big love because I’m rewarded for it in so many ways. I feel the satisfaction of working through my own stuff. I get feedback, mostly positive, from readers who are touched by my writing. I get to write about things that are important to me. And, in some ways, this blog is one long love letter to my precious daughter. This column has become more than just a way for me to chronicle my process; it’s a connection for others, too.

My honesty and openness has had very real consequences in my dating life. And the feedback and fallout are not always positive. But, after meeting two generous, darling single moms who look forward to each new column, and after connecting with others, whether it’s via Facebook or Twitter or blogs, who find resonance in my stories, how could I not continue to write?

In a training session I recently ran on how to use Twitter, Facebook, and other social media for building awareness, someone asked me what would happen to the name of this blog and to my Twitter handle (@datingdad) when I was no longer single.

I answered, “I cannot wait until I have that problem to deal with.

Détente: May 2009

Last week was Simone’s “student-led” parent conference at school. It’s a great concept. The third graders gather up a stack of prescribed examples of their work at their desks, and then have a checklist of things to show their parents. Simone did a great job of showing us some of her fiction (Viva Piñata fanfic that’s running 67 pages at last count), sharing the novel she’s reading, and taking us through her latest math assignments.

When she got to science, she mentioned a project that referenced the children’s book by Demi, “The Empty Pot.” It’s actually a favorite of mine from my grad school days. In fact, Simone’s mom and I worked on a project during grad school together, before we were dating (I wasn’t available at the time), and we used that very book. In fact, you could almost say that book was, in some ways, responsible for our finding our way to each other.

At that moment, though, Simone was sitting between her mother and me at her desk. We were both hunched in kid-size plastic chairs, flanking our little girl, taking turns asking her questions and making comments about her work, and occasionally trading looks, raised eyebrows and all, when she’d say something funny or brilliant.

So when Simone mentioned the book, I thought I hadn’t heard her correctly.

“‘The Empty Pot’?” I blurted out. “By Demi?”

Both she and her mom said “yes,” and her mom looked over Simone’s head at me. We smiled at each other. Probably the first real smile we’ve shared that wasn’t directly related to something Simone said or did in more than six years. It was the briefest recognition of the history we’d both abandoned, and it came and went so quickly that Simone had no idea it happened. It was the briefest moment of magic.

It didn’t change anything, but it did serve as an indicator that we’ve found ourselves in a better place.

The three of us have travelled a tumultuous road; not as full of ire and cruelty as some divorces I’ve seen, and certainly civil 92% of the time, but we’ve had some very ugly moments between us. Early on, I had my outbursts of frustration and disgust, but I learned fairly quickly (I think, I hope, though you’d have to ask Simone’s mom) to take a deep breath and let go. We realized that our best bet was to communicate the important stuff via email, in order to put some space between us.

The worst times, though, seemed to be during major transitions in Simone’s mother’s life—in the months before she remarried, and when she was early in her pregnancy. During those times, which, coincidentally happened to be when Simone had teachers who truly didn’t get her, and who weren’t particularly nurturing, Simone became a major behavioral problem at school; acting out, and exploding into spectacular meltdowns that left everyone shaken.

Her mother’s first instinct was to blame these changes in Simone’s ability to cope on me. She honestly believed I was harming our child, and she would take initial steps (in mediation) to change the custody arrangements from the 50/50 we’d agreed to. During those times, she’d treat me with such contempt that Simone was afraid to mention my name in her presence, even though we always made an effort to hide those times of conflict from our girl. It got bad. Really bad.

And though we’d attend parent-teacher conferences together, Simone’s mom would rarely make eye contact with me. She’d speak to the teachers and me in the exact same, civil-but-cool tone of voice. Through the reassurances from friends (especially the Peach) and family that I was, indeed, a competent, loving, if not faultless father, and after feeling battered again and again, I trained myself into a relative sense of immunity to her indictments. She knew very well how to make me second guess my parental abilities, but I gradually realized that she couldn’t really know what life was like for Simone and me.

Clarification: I lashed out occasionally, too. I wasn’t without fault. But I never, ever questioned her ability to be a good mom, or her right to equal parenting time.

For a few weeks before the new baby was born, I was truly worried that Simone’s mother would find a way to take her away from me. My friends acquainted with family law (attorneys and judges) told me again and again that she would have a very tough, expensive battle that would probably fail, but I still waited and waited for the thunderclouds.

But what happened instead surprised me.

After Simone’s baby sister was born, the clouds parted, and her mom became more than civil. In fact, sometimes, she’d be, well, friendly. I’m not sure what shifted. I honestly have no idea. My theories range from the thought that she realized my relationship with the girl is healthy, to maybe feeling the relief that I’m there for Simone while she and her husband nurture the new baby. Or, maybe, time has finally smoothed over the rough spots enough to allow her to let go of the anger.

But the reasons don’t really matter (until the next wave, if it comes). What matters is that Simone feels secure in our détente. She still tries, occasionally, to play us off of each other in order to gain some favor, but it’s generally lackluster, almost like she’s going through the motions because she thinks it’s just barely worth a try. And when I call Simone on it, she laughs a small, embarrassed laugh and shrugs her shoulders.

I’m enjoying this time. It’s nice to be able to smile at Simone’s mom and tell her a funny story about something Simone did over the weekend. It’s so much easier now to work out logistics when Simone’s out of school for one reason or another. There’s a new lightness in our interactions that wasn’t there before, and I don’t want to question it. I want us to all be friends.

I don’t harbor any resentment at all against Simone’s mom or the husband. I’m actually grateful for the last six-plus years of my life, for the magic that’s become such an integral part of the world around me, and for the challenges and successes that could only have come by being free of the situation we were in. I’m so happy for Simone that she has a baby sister, and I love holding the sweet little thing when I’m invited to.

We still have our bumpy moments, but that’s to be expected when raising a precocious, opinionated, way-too-empowered young lady. I mean, where do you think she got it her strong personality?