Odes to daddies

I woke up in my lovely Mata Hari's bed this morning with the birds twittering outside and the sounds of feet thundering up and down the stairs. It's a good day to be back in Melbourne.

After seeing no rain for a million years in Adelaide, I sat in a little bar last night while the skies opened up and released sheets of water to the earth. And I saw that it was good.

But that was probably because I hadn't eaten all day and was on the cham. It does funny things to your eyes.

Here is my article from Sunday. It's about my dear papa.

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WHEN I was still young enough to believe in the Easter Bunny, my father would craft long and elaborate letters from our floppy-eared friend thanking us for our generous gifts of brandy and sugar snaps.

He'd update us on what had been going on at The Burrow, filling in little bits of gossip here and there about Mrs Bunny and their scallywag children. Then he'd wish us well for the next year and sign his name with a charcoal-stamped paw print.

Sometimes I like to think of my Pops sitting there late at night with his little projects, scratching away to create a fantasy world for all his little Fords.

We still talk excitedly about the cake he made for my brother Toby's eighth birthday. It came out as a plain old train until my Dad had all the little boys yell out the catchphrase from their favourite cartoon: "Transformers, TRANSFORM!"

And there, before eyes as wide as they could possibly go, the carefully-engineered chocolate segmented train transformed into a genuine bitchin' robot.*

Scout's honour.

I've written a lot of things about my mother in the past, and not just for this paper. My love for her has been obvious and overwhelming, and spills into everything I do.

Tributes to my father have largely remained in my heart. That same expanse of love exists, but it's quieter.

I can sense the little boy hiding inside the 1.92m bearded giant, and find myself at odd times feeling a maternal need to take care of him.

He has always taken care of us, hiding his fears and worries lest the veneer of invincible protector be threatened.

His life philosophy has been dominated by the idea that it's a man's primary role to financially provide for his family. It took him a long time to realise one could provide and nurture at the same time. Most of my childhood was spent with him working long hours, often overseas for months and months at a time.

Of all his children, he and I are the most alike.

Stubborn yet whimsical, independent yet vulnerable. He was the outline I struggled to colour myself into, but with him gone it was sometimes hard to see the edges.

We had our teenage difficulties like anyone else, sometimes erupting into monstrous, bitter arguments over the stupidest things.

I reflect sometimes in abject shame and horror at the way I used to behave.

But whether physically or not, he has always been a constant source of emotional support in my life.

He has always believed in raising strong daughters who aren't afraid to take advantage of any opportunity, whose bodies are their own and nobody else's to control, who are capable of providing for themselves so that they need never settle for less because they have no other option.

I know he's proud to have a daughter unafraid to speak her mind, even if he doesn't always agree with her.

THERE'S a photograph on my bedside table. I'm about two years old in blue dungarees and bright-red gum boots and I'm walking next to the tallest man in the world.

He's looking down at me and I'm looking at my feet walking in front of me in the way that curious children do. I was always the kind of child that wanted to do things independently, so I'm not holding his hand. But if he'd walked away I would have cried. This is just the way we are.

We talk about motherhood a lot in this country, and elevate it to a mystical status that is seemingly impenetrable.

We forget that fatherhood is just as important. That fathers not only help shape their children, but learn from them in return.

It's time we discuss these relationships more openly and pay tribute to them.

I wouldn't be the person I am today without my mother's influence, but I'd be someone else entirely without my father's.

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Anyhoo. I'm off to shop.

Peace out (does anyone know if there are any secret comedy shows happening this weekend?)

* HOW FREAKING AWESOME IS THAT? I keep trying to get him to do it again so I can film it for You Tube and he can become more famous than that evolution of dance guy. But he's a shy bear.