The Funny Side of Fatherhood

They say humor is the number one attribute women look for in a man. We all know that’s bullshit, but I’m going to take that at face value and run with it here. We all know humor won’t pay the bills, or get you a nicer house with a bigger yard (unless you’re Ray Romano), or stop your mother-in-law from asking those annoying, prying questions like “are you okay for money?,” but it will get you through the day, and sometimes that’s all a woman needs when she’s knee deep in diaper changes, and baby puke, and the daily stresses of caring for a child, or worse, children.


Gentlemen, your wife needs a clown, a competent clown who can clean up after himself, and cook, and change diapers too, but a clown none-the-less. Your job- long after your good looks have waned and your 24” pythons (big biceps) have turned into gelatinous goose flesh- is simply to entertain. Sure, a good job is nice, and she’d prefer if there was more hair on your head than in the sink, but at the end of the day when she’s tired and she wants to send all of your offspring to live in the Circus, the most important thing in the world to her is your sense of whimsy- because it’s the only thing that will keep her sane (other than a bottle of wine and a bubble bath).

“Laugh and the world laughs with you. Cry and you cry alone” they say. I don’t know what that means, but if understanding it means you don’t have to sleep on the couch, fake it. Laugh dammit, and make your wife laugh too. Kids draw on your walls? Get a Mr. Clean Magic Eraser, and laugh. If your wife gives you 10-month-old daughter peanut butter for the first time and her gag reflex causes her to throw up all over your Mother-in-law, laugh. And when your wife gives your daughter a second scoop of Peanut Butter just to make sure she’s not throwing it up because she allergic to it and she projectile vomits on your Mother-in-law again, laugh harder.  It’s your job.

Wife calls you in to the bathroom when she’s giving your 18-month-old daughter a bath because your little girl took a dump in the tub? Laugh. Can’t stop laughing when your wife’s gag reflex kicks in because she can’t stand the sight of a floater, laugh longer; laugh harder.  She may hate you in the moment, but long after she takes your daughter out of the tub and you’re still trying to fish it out with a goldfish scoop, she’ll get the joke, and the world will be a better place.

And remember, it’s okay to laugh at yourself too. Took your 2-year-old daughter to pee on the toilet only to realize she already soiled her underwear with something way worse than urine, and you just inadvertently touched it – laugh.  Stupidly let your daughter hold her own bowl of spaghetti and meatballs and she threw it all over the floor – laugh. Forgot to put a diaper on your daughter during her nap while she was potty training and she woke up because her bed was soaked in urine and you’re the only one home to both calm her down and strip the bed so you can wash her sheets – laugh.  It’s your best quality after all. It’s the quality that told your wife that even though you weren’t ever going to be CEO of a fortune 500 company, you would at least make an awesome dad.

When you plan and God laughs, embrace it. He’s not laughing at you, he’s laughing with you, and all you need to do is keep on smiling and the world will be your play thing. Shit will happen. Children will inevitably destroy all that you hold dear, but if you can keep it together, and more importantly keep your wife from losing it, you’re a winner.

So here’s to all the fat, aging, balding dudes- or dads, if you will- coming to terms with their true value. Your sense of humor may not be the number one thing that got your wife hooked on you in the first place, but it’s certainly the glue that’s keeping her sane as you live out the American Dream of duel incomes, 2.2 kids and a white picket fence.

Aren’t kids grand?