When You Call Me Daddy

The sweetest sounding word in the world.

I love words, that is why I am a writer. I love the magic that happens when you place the right words in a certain order. They can make people feel anything, from outrage and fury to joy and enlightenment.

But I have one very particular word that I love more than any word in the entire English language.

The sound of this word can stop me in my tracks. It can melt my heart. It instantly rearranges my priorities and immediately realigns my perspective. It gives my life meaning and purpose. It's the reason I do everything that I do. I never tire of hearing it, never. I am filled with the deepest gratitude each and every time I heard the sound of it.

And that word is Daddy.

I am not the one to judge what kind of daddy I am, that is for my two daughters to decide, but for the last ten or so years I have tried, with everything that I have, to be the very best one that I can possibly be. No mission has ever been more important to me. No goal has ever given me more incentive. Everything else pales in comparison.

And today is Father's Day and so it is a day when the girls choose to celebrate me. I got homemade cards with beautiful messages handwritten inside, poems and drawings too. I also got three used toys from my youngest daughter because the present they had ordered didn't arrive in time. I'm more than happy with that. I don't ever need anything else but to just spend time with them.

But, it is me that is really celebrating. I am the real winner today, and indeed every day, because I get to be Daddy to these two incredibly adorable creatures.

And yet, Father's Day is always tinged with some sadness because my daddy is no longer with us. It makes me think of how he must have felt when he was on the receiving end of me and my brother's homemade cards and gifts. I would like to think that he felt the same sense of joy that I do upon hearing the word daddy. I would like to think that it stopped him in his tracks when I called him by that name. It's not that I didn't know how much he loved me, because I did, but he died before I became a dad and so we never got to compare notes on just how it feels.

And, I miss that.

I would love to have that conversation.

So, when I'm daddy, I'm always daddy for me and for him.

And so those are all the reasons why daddy will always be my favourite word of all time.