\u201cSee, dad?\u201d she said. \u201cIt\u2019s your stubble. See? It looks just like you.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYeah, alright,\u201d I said. \u201cLook at that. Just like me.\u201d<\/p>\n
It didn\u2019t look like me. It didn\u2019t look ANYTHING like me.<\/p>\n
Actually, I wish I looked like it. This clay pen holder my daughter made me. A friend down the street \u2026 well, her mother has a kiln and some clay. How cool is that? They made Father\u2019s Day presents. Clay cups with faces on them. To hold pens. You\u2019ve never officially been a kid until you\u2019ve made your dad a clay cup with his face on it. The first recorded Father\u2019s Day cup with a face on it dates back to 10,000 B.C. There was also a figure made out of macaroni and a drawing of a race car that read, \u201cDad drive fast,\u201d with a police car chasing him.
\n
\nMy cup had vampire-like eyebrows. A short nose that didn\u2019t jut out like an X-ACTO blade. Piercing eyes. A debonair smile. A hole in the head for pens. (How handy would that be! I would love a hole in my head. I could keep snacks in there.) I thought he was handsome. I wanted to be the cup.<\/p>\n
And then there was brown stuff all over his chin. Little dabbled on spots of paint covering the entire lower third. A forest of it.<\/p>\n
Stubble!<\/p>\n
Cool stubble. Good-looking stubble. Dare I say it? Sexy.<\/p>\n
It was Don Johnson in \u201cMiami Vice\u201d stubble. Not like in real life. Like I\u2019ve been playing in dirt all morning. Or eating Oreo cookies during a drunken fit. <\/p>\n
It\u2019s funny what kids see when they look at us. Mine sees stubble. It\u2019s been the bane of her existence since she was a child. She has always endured it as I went in for a kiss.<\/p>\n
\u201cAhh, sand paper!\u201d she would scream. Or, \u201cAhh, prickly pears!\u201d Or, \u201cAhh, shards of glass! Quick \u2026 take me to the hospital!\u201d<\/p>\n
It was always followed by: \u201cGo \u2026 shave \u2026 right now, mister!\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI just did!\u201d I would tell her. \u201cIt\u2019s not my fault my stubble grows like kudzu and feels like a cactus. I\u2019m Cuban and Sicilian, dangit!\u201d<\/p>\n
On my face, that\u2019s my distinguishing characteristic. I\u2019m \u201cStubbleman!\u201d Bum-bum-BUMMM! (That and the ski jump nose. She obviously ran out of clay for that one.)<\/p>\n
I get a kick out of how kids see us. I would love to see some of the things I created for my dad. He had a beard. Beards are nearly impossible to do on clay cups. Not impossible, just hard to get right.<\/p>\n
You have two options. Rake the clay with a comb, which makes your father\u2019s face look like a newly plowed field. Or roll out some facial hair, which makes his chin look like Medusa\u2019s head. \u201cWhy are there snakes writhing out of my cheeks!?!\u201d<\/p>\n
I now understand some of the looks my creations got. \u201cHey, buddy \u2026 thanks! It looks \u2026 um \u2026 just like me. Will you excuse me for a minute? I need to go shave off the beard I\u2019ve had for 30 years.\u201d<\/p>\n
Father\u2019s Day gifts make us dads see us for what we really look like. Sometimes they\u2019re spot on. Sometimes a little off. \u201cI don\u2019t look like a lump of hamburger meat, do I?\u201d<\/p>\n
They\u2019re how our children see us. And I\u2019ve always wondered about that. Don\u2019t you? What they think of us? How they picture us? Strong and courageous and triumphant? Or meek and wimpy and sad? \u201cI don\u2019t look like wilted spinach, do I?\u201d<\/p>\n
Then there\u2019s that big giant smile on my cup. Like the Joker on Batman. I would need cosmetic surgery \u2014 a jaw re-adjustment \u2014 just to get close to it in real life. It forms a \u201cU.\u201d That warms my heart. Makes it a special Father\u2019s Day gift. That she sees me that way. Happy. Full of smiles. And, of course, surrounded by a forest of handsome \u201cMiami Vice\u201d stubble.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
\u201cSee, dad?\u201d she said. \u201cIt\u2019s your stubble. See? It looks just like you.\u201d \u201cYeah, alright,\u201d I said. \u201cLook at that. Just like me.\u201d It didn\u2019t look like me. It didn\u2019t look ANYTHING like me. Actually, I wish I looked like it. This clay pen holder my daughter made me. A friend down the street \u2026 well, her mother has a kiln and some clay. How cool is that? They made Father\u2019s Day presents. Clay cups with faces on them. To hold pens. You\u2019ve never officially been a kid until you\u2019ve made your dad a clay cup with his face on it. The first recorded Father\u2019s Day cup with a face on it dates back to 10,000 B.C. There was also a figure made out of macaroni and a drawing of a race car that read, \u201cDad drive fast,\u201d with a police car chasing him.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[436,8],"tags":[525,524,526],"class_list":["post-1016","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-2013-nutshells","category-parenthoodandchildren","tag-clay","tag-fathers-day","tag-pen-holder"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nutshellcity.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1016","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nutshellcity.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nutshellcity.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nutshellcity.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nutshellcity.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1016"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.nutshellcity.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1016\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1017,"href":"https:\/\/www.nutshellcity.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1016\/revisions\/1017"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nutshellcity.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1016"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nutshellcity.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1016"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nutshellcity.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1016"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}