Father’s Day lately has become a bittersweet occasion and a time for inevitable melancholy. On the one hand, the title of “Dad” has been one of my most cherished accomplishments, but the dual role of son/father can be a source of grief, exacerbated by the addition of “Grandpa” to my credentials. I’m like a doctor tagging yet another degree to his already cumbersome signature.
Joe Mannino, SON, PHDad, GPa, and, naturally, the coveted future title of GGP. Endless regressions echoing forward through the continuum of time. This day can weigh heavy on my spirit. Each successive generational title, bluntly marking the passage of time, our futile struggle against aged obsolescence, and the omnipresence of mortality.
The source of this melancholy is that my Pops didn’t get to join me in the ascension of title, at least along my branch of the family tree. It can be exhausting trying to balance the joy and pride that fatherhood has granted me with the loss of my Pops nearly 19 years ago. Maybe that’s how we are meant to age. Moments of joy and pain dancing together in disarray like two fumbling teens with four left feet, clomping through life’s dance, desperate to avoid the calamity of their awkwardness.
We juggle these disparate emotions while trying to remain joyous in the moment. The effect is a day awash in nostalgia, heartache, and optimism. All blended together in gradients of grateful grief, leaving this man of multiple hats stranded somewhere in the fray at the end of this pensive and beautiful day.
Mannino Acid 