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HOW I SPENT MY SUMMER VACATION

I've been working on this column for the entire summer, proving the business theorem that work expands to fill time. It took two months because, somewhere within my mental blueprint for this column, I noted that it did not have to be done until September. Why September? Because the rhythm of childhood school days stays with most of us long after school days are over. The summer, a period somewhere between eight and ten weeks in length (depending on the schedule in your old school district), was a magical time. A time when responsibilities lifted from shoulders, floated up into the atmosphere, and,
like the autumn leaves turning to crisp reds and golds, didn't fully float down to earth until some time after Halloween.

For me, "summer" was only half a word. The full word was "summer-vacation." What are you doing for the summer vacation? Where are you going for the summer vacation? How was your summer vacation? Summer vacation was an endless time that rivaled eternity. An unbroken string of seventy days, each day being about sixty hours long. Now, of course, the summer lasts about twenty minutes. "It's September already," I say repeatedly, "where did the summer go?" To which, of course, my fellow adult mourners reply, "You're right, doesn't seem like there was a
summer this year." "Where did you go on your summer vacation?" I ask a colleague. "I'm a parent," he says, "there's no such thing as a summer vacation - - - there's just going away with the kids."

On my summer vacation of 1998, I moved my practice to a new location, then I moved my personal residence to a new town, then I unpacked countless boxes, and now it's September. All of this, of course, stirred-up all kinds of fatherhood issues for me. It began with the garage.

Luxury is an attached garage with an automatic door opener. In this fantasy I walk into my kitchen, pour myself a travel mug filled with Dunkin Donuts hazelnut coffee (I am not a Starbucks man) and open the door to my climate controlled attached garage. I enter my car, adjust the vehicle's interior environment, push a button to activate the door opener, and drive from the garage. The weather outside is of no concern to me. I have moved directly from kitchen to auto on my way to wherever. Your fantasy might be a little
more exotic, but I'm a man of simple tastes.

Now I've owned or rented several homes with attached garages over the years. I never got to put my car in any one of them. Where would a car fit? There are carriages, strollers, portable basketball hoops and soccer nets, lawnmowers, garden tools, barbecues complete with gas tanks, as well as bicycles, rollerblades, and all of the old furniture I will never again use but just can't part with - - - maybe the kids will need it someday.

This summer I put all that behind me! "We don't want
you to move to an apartment," my four kids said, "rent another house." None of them have ever lived in an apartment. Their primary residence remains the
last house their mother and I shared before the divorce. "The things you own, own you," I tell them, "I need to remain flexible. I don't want the
responsibility of another house." I was going to tell them about Herb, but realized the story would be meaningless. I'll tell you the story instead.

Herb is a fifty years old social worker in private practice in Great Neck, Long Island. He is a colleague, a friend, and an extraordinary psychotherapist. Herb's father was a taxi driver. He would get up, get into his cab, and drive around for a good twelve hours a day listening to the stories of all his passengers. He would come home exhausted and frequently emotionally depleted - - - not from the driving, but from the stories bombarding him without a break. One passenger would get out of the cab, the
next would get in. Herb vowed he would never live the work life his father lived, he would never become a cab driver. So he became a therapist instead, clocking miles on his imported Scandinavian recliner. Twenty five years later, Herb points out to me that his father always had the meter running in the front seat - - - Herb's meter is ticking in his head. The patient / passenger leaves / exits - - - Next! Where to? Get there in ten managed care sessions? No, I think the journey will take longer than that.

Anyway, Herb and his wife raised two wonderful kids. Just like in the joke, the dog died and the kids went away to college. Now I'm sitting in Herb's den, surrounded by the magnificent greenery growing in every corner, listening to his summer vacation plans. Herb says, "But what am I going to do about all these plants. I'm so tied down by the damn plants!"

I am now renting a lovely two bedroom townhouse. No lawn to take care of. No carriages, stollers, old furniture. The montessori school in my office building has taken the gerbils. My plants are all low maintenance cacti. My children and I reached a compromise. There's a regulation size ping pong
table filling the garage. Over the first ping pong game with one of my daughters, she brings up the subject of getting a dog. She tells me that we
always owned large dogs when I lived with the family. Now we can get the small dog she always wanted - - - an apartment-sized dog.

I've been reading in the news about the recent death of television and screen actor, Robert Young. I'm old enough to remember actually watching the first episodes of Father Knows Best. It was a rare time for fathers, a time when the possibility of a dad "knowing best" actually existed. Remember Fred
MacMurray as a single dad who managed to do the right thing both in the office and the kitchen in "My Three Sons?" Now there was a man before his time.

The public image of fathers, of course, quickly metamorphosized to those best typified by such shows as Married With Children and The Simpsons. Stay with me for a few more lines, I do know where I'm going with this. During my twelve years in public school, the curriculum heavily stressed the concept of
America as the "great melting pot." Black, brown, white, yellow, red, it made no difference. In America, we all jumped into the pot and somehow came out
looking the same, as if we all had the same mother and father. It was an interesting approach to an orderly and productive post-war society, democracy,
and racial harmony. The only problem was that it just didn't work. The melting pot theory was eventually melted down into nothingness. My numerous school teacher friends tell me that today they teach the "salad theory." America is a salad. What makes a great salad? Diversity, of course! Several different types of lettuce, radicchio, endive, black and green olives, carrots, radishes, celery, cheeses, onions, peppers, imitation bacon bits, and croutons. Dressings to suit every taste. French, Russian, Greek, Caesar, oil and vinegar, balsamic vinegar, honey mustard, low fat, fat free, low sodium, from a jar, an envelope, or the refrigerated section. You can even get it with Paul Newman's face on the label. The moral of this story? You don't have to be Robert Yourng or Fred MacMurray. You can be whatever kind of father you choose. But you do need to choose. To help you get in shape for the choice, follow me over to the mind gym.

Send your questions to Dr. Ted at: drtedsaid@fathersworld.com

Dr. Ted Horowitz is a psychotherapist who specilaizes in coaching divorced and widowed parents to manage their lives with optimum effectiveness. His practice is in Queens and Port Jefferson Station, NY. He is a single father of four.

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