My First Ever Picture Book: My Sometimes Dad

This one is close to home.  I long for narratives that do not treat family reconfiguration and breakdown as something that only happens to other people.  COVID-19 ushered in a new era of family breakdown – symbolized by comedian John Mulaney when he introduced his latest comedy special with the equivalent of “haven’t seen you in a while.  How are you?  Gotten divorced?”  Children urgently need complicated narratives that help them to deal with family reconfiguration in ways that acknowledge its pain.  We need picturebooks for kids that do not only feature perfect “happily ever afters.” 

When reading books on divorce to a class of kids, I felt this lack keenly.  A small boy didn’t bother to raise his hand before calling out “where are the stories about divorce where you don’t see the dad anymore?”  Stalling for time, I said “who else would like to see a book like this?”  A number of children raised their hands.  Searching for books about divorces that do not end happily yielded far too few results.  It was in the spirit of this lack that I wrote my own book My Sometimes Dad.

My Sometimes Dad 
written by Shoshana Magnet and illustrated by Haeon Grace Kang

This book took two years to write and comes out of the mouths of children who have struggled with inconsistent, unavailable, or no-longer-available parents.  We don’t have the phrase “deadbeat dad” for no reason, and this book aims to put pictures and words to the complex realities of loving someone who may or may not be able to be there for you, the “sometimes” parent.  For all the kids and all the grownups who have struggled to find words to describe their "sometimes" parent - this is the book for you.  Whether you are a child of a wonderful stepdad who disappeared when his marriage to your mom broke up or whether you have a child who had a special bond with a beloved caregiver until they didn't, this book is for the kids of all the kinds of "sometimes parents" that exist.  From the the "sometimes parents" who disappear into addiction to the "sometimes parents" who are right there in your living room but who somehow still manage to remain aloof, ill-attuned, or under some version of what Alison Bechdel would call the "plexiglass dome" - an emotional barrier where you might even be able to see them, but they still aren't there: I see you, and I believe you.  And it hurts.      

Illustrated by the incomparable Haeon Grace Kang (also author of The ABCs of Women in Music, with Anneli Loepp Thiessen), My Sometimes Dad talks about the painful attachment of a child to a parent who is inconsistently present.  Excitement to see the parent, grief, rage, confusion and love are all present – often in a single moment.  This book also features a dad who is a trans man.  Part of the painful part of this time of increasing homo- and trans- phobia has been that children who comes from queer families are being made to feel more different.  “Why is your mom so weird?” asked a little boy of one of my little boys.  To which there is easy no answer.  We need books that celebrate pride and multiple kinds of families.  And too, we need books that acknowledge that queer families do not always work out.  Just like heterosexual families, just like every family: painful disconnection and ruptures happen that are not or will not be healed.  So too is this rupture found in My Sometimes Dad: which features a dad who used to be around all the time, but left, and now is present only sometimes.  “What’s it like having a different kind of a family from the other families in your class?” I asked the kids in a grade 1 class.  “It’s sort of good and sort of bad” they said.  Like many families, like life.  This book provides the opportunity to name sadness in queer families too, allowing not only for joy and pride, but for the grief and sorrow that are part of all human families and the human experience.
 
This book begins with a little boy who is trying to understand the abrupt change in his relationship with his dad.  

"My dad used to live here.  But now he doesn't."

Unlike his friends, this boy's dad doesn't have a special place for him at his house.  The boy's friend Jason's parents are divorced too.  But Jason's dad is still very much present.  At Jason's dad's house he has a bed, toys, a special chair, and his own toothbrush, but:

"My dad isn't like that.
I don't have much stuff there.  One or two toys, that's it.  They're old.  I don't even like them that much anymore."

It wasn't always like this though, this child's dad used to be attuned and connected:

"When my dad used to live here, he played with me a lot.  
He made good breakfasts.
And he always let me choose what I wanted to watch on TV.
He was the gentlest at putting band-aids on.  Mom's the worst at that, but dad was the best."

Sometimes, inexplicably, things change. It is confusing for anyone, but especially a child, when a parent's capacity inexplicably changes.  Sometimes the old loving parent is gone - dead - even sometimes while they are still alive.

"It's not the same, I feel nervous around my dad now that I don't see him so much.  Sometimes, he doesn't come."  

My Sometimes Dad explores the contradictory emotions that children can feel around sometimes parents:

"Sometimes, I feel like I wait all week to see my dad.  I'm so excited when I see him pull up.
But then it's weird.
When I get into the car and he says, "Hi buddy," all of a sudden I'm so mad.  
I'm so mad.  It's like I have a dragon inside me.  It wants to say, "You are the worst dad ever!" or "Hello, I hate you!"

And then sometimes the dragon is more sad than angry, because when it spoke it said:

"Why did you leave, dad? Why did you leave me?"

And the reason I wrote this book is for all the children who need to hear it's not their fault.  For all the children whose "sometimes parents" will never say these words aloud to them, here is this book to tell them what is true:

"My dad didn't say much. He said:
'I don't really know how to be close to people. I'm more of a sometimes dad. 
And that's not fair.  And it's not your fault.'"

For all the kids and grownups who have struggled with sometimes parents, this book is from my heart to yours.  

My Sometimes Dad book can be ordered here. If you live in Ottawa, you can also purchase copies at Singing Pebble Books on Main St. and Black Squirrel Books in the Glebe.

Until Soon,