Very few people in my family understand the word dad. For some, the man that should have been their dad died before he could move from a father, the man who is biologically related to them, to a dad, the man who would raise them. For others, they dad they knew died before he could watch them grow up to become teenagers. Their dads never got to see them graduate high school or college, fall in love, fall out of love, or grow into adults. For me, Dad is the guy who has been there for it all.
When the Bruin's won the Stanley Cup on Wednesday, I immediately opened my computer and sent a message to my dad. There was no text in the body of the e-mail; it only consisted of the subject line “YAYYYYYYYYY.” I knew Dad would understand what the e-mail was about. I knew he would be watching the game. He was the one who tried to get me to watch hockey while I was growing up. We lived in Maine, after all. He successfully taught me about baseball, and tried taking me to AHL hockey games and watching Bruins games with me on TV. I never got into, it, though, until I moved away and went to a school that rivaled Maine's college team. Dad didn't let it phase him, though, and quickly learned the ins and outs of my team so he could share his interest with me.
I knew that Dad would check his e-mail that night. He always claimed that my brother and I were the ones who inspired him to embrace new technology. We got him a DVD player five years after everyone else in the country had one, an iPod when he was still listening to records, and a GPS even though he still trusts his maps. But Dad had a car phone before any of our friends did, and a Blackberry before I understood the difference between that and a Palm Pilot. It was true, though, that he didn't quite understand what it meant to have his devices. When I traveled to see my college hockey team play in the national championship game, Dad knew he was going to want to send messages to me while I was in the stadium. I gave a tutorial beforehand clarifying the difference between an e-mail, a text message (SMS as he called it), and a blackberry message. Even since then, I have been at hockey games with my non-internet phone and returned home to find e-mails from Dad asking about the in game score.
While I wanted for Dad to respond, I opened another tab on my Internet browser to see what was going on with my social networks. My twenty-something friends were celebrating with tweets and status updates. None of us had been alive the last time the Bruins won the cup. Now, we had seen all four major sports teams in our city with their championship in the past seven years. I posted a status about how lucky I was to be a Boston sports fan in this era.
I saw the number in the title bar of my e-mail tab, and I jumped over to see Dad's response. He called the win “spectacular.” I can sense the awe in his voice, the appreciation, the understanding of how great this was after living through a 39 year drought. It was something none of my friends could understand. He wrote of how happy he was for the goalie, sentiments I had wanted to send back in my response. I wrote back, and he responded once more before I fell asleep. I was happy to share the moment with someone I knew would appreciate it the most.
It never occurred to me that, in the time I spent being grateful for Boston sports, I should have been grateful for Dad. Grateful for e-mails that need no context, peanut butter and fluff sandwiches, lobster dinners, minor league baseball, and a mustache. I should be grateful that any day I want can be a dad's day.
