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Fatherhood in Taree

We just came back from Taree on the north (ish) coast of New South Wales where I was part of the Taree Fatherhood festival, held over the fathers’ day weekend. A good thing really. A lot of great work by Peter Glencross (and I’m sure, many others unknown to me). And after all these years, I now qualify as a father. Perhaps the easiest part is just BECOMING a father. Whether I am a good father or not…you can ask my son in the years to come.

The festival had its serious side and it’s lighter, tho no less important, side. The concert with Archie Roach, Shane Howard and others was terrific…the er…photo below was sort of intended to be a shot of our boy dancing in front of the stage…believe me, archie roach and friends are only JUST behind.

Some thoughts about the experience of those days:
– Being a father is a wonderfully tough, toughly wonderful thing to be
– Being a man in Australia 2008 is an interesting, demanding, tiring and inspiring thing
– Fun is good for us
– A circle of men can be simply a very good thing
– I am drawn constantly back to thinking about how things can happen…’out there.’ If connection and relationship are fundamentally important to us as human beings, (and I think they are) how do we encourage this in today’s world? Especially in what seems to be shaping up as the epi-center of increasing depression. The English speaking whitefellas’ world?
– And loneliness especially for men in this epi-center is something to be concerned about
– I am encouraged, and encouraged to think some more, about my part in it all
– And…life is good
– Thanks.

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