What a father could have taught September 27th, 2023.

You're Gavin. Thanks for your quick reply.

I really think this exchange is going to be fruitful, at least to hope so.

In my last letter, I warned that it was possible that you were going to get some

boomer perspective from me.

And it was good that I did that because I can see I'm going to have to start

there before getting into all the issues surrounding whiteness.

I promise we will get into the ethnic stuff in the next round.

You grew up without a dad being very present in your life,

just as a lot of your peers did.

As this has ramifications, I think we really need to go into those in order to

think clearly about the larger issues, but we will get to those larger

issues soon enough. Trust me, they are larger issues, not deeper issues.

Growing up without a dad means that certain things went missing.

Some of them are obvious, but what you're still freighted with symbolic value.

I don't know if this was the case in your situation, but I'm going to just

make up a couple of examples.

Say that your dad never stood behind you and reached over your shoulders in

order to teach you how to tie a neck tie.

Or say that your dad never stood behind you again in order to teach you how to

hold a bat or how to position your feet when you were holding that bat.

There's something about a father's presence in those sorts of things that

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