Let’s dedicate a thought for our dads - EDITORIAL

Dads are the least celebrated and hardly receive gifts. Most often what they do is taken for granted; especially the extra hours they slog in office to ensure the home fires are burning. Some fathers are engaged in employment where life is exposed to huge risks. This could be why there is a day set aside each year to acknowledge what fathers do for their loved ones. Universally that day is the third Sunday in the month of June. This year fathers received much attention on June 20.

We live in an era where fathers are seen less at home. Employment opportunities abroad are greater and often it’s the father who decides to find employment oversees to raise the living conditions at home.

There is a gamut of things to do if you want to celebrate the day with your dad. According to an article published on www.firstpost.com there are suggestions ranging from cooking, playing games, gifting a special cake and having a marathon movie session as things to do with him on this special day. A few movies are dedicated to dads and some of those that have caught the eye of movies fans are ‘The pursuit of happiness’, ‘Elle’ and ‘IndicWire’. Did anyone suggest that you have a chat with your dad and talk about a subject that would pull at his heartstrings?
The first official ‘Dad’s Day’ was celebrated on June 18, 1972 in the USA under the auspices of the then President Richard Nixon. But the proposal to give recognition for such a day was made years earlier by Sonera Smart Dodd because she wanted to give her dad William Jackson Smart much recognition for bringing her up along with her other five siblings. There are records to show that Father’s Day was celebrated sans pomp and pageantry on June 19, 1910, but there was nothing official about it.  

In a country like Sri Lanka the majority of dads who were born in the pre-independence era slogged in unskilled labour and made sure to educate their offspring. The children who are academics at present should feel proud of their roots even if their fathers were not academics and might be wearing the traditional Sri Lanka attire which is the sarong. 

‘The Indian Express’ dedicated space recently to carry inspiring quotes that give value to ‘Father’s Day’. One that caught the eye of the readers is copied here for inspiration and posterity. “Dads are most ordinary men turned by love into heroes, adventurers, story tellers and singers of songs’. 

But there have also been accounts of where children have longed for their dead fathers. Recently a postman from Leicester found a letter in the letter box in ‘Braunstone’ without a stamp or address. The letter was penned by the late father’s daughter. When the postman read the writing on the outside and realised it was to reach the dad in heaven he got emotional. With permission from his superiors the postman traced the girl’s house and handed the letter to one Ms Tully. The girl’s family was traced following a post on facebook; the post had by then attracted over thousands of comments. The postman also made arrangements to gift the girl with a father-daughter figurine. 
Dads are special figures at home and some lucky children (especially daughters) get to see themselves being given away in marriage on the most special day in a female’s life. 

Celebrating father’s day is good in a way because it teaches children to do something significant for their fathers when they are alive. Countless are the occasions where dads have been ill-treated during retirement; but their funerals have been held with heavy expenditure incurred on decorations, flowers and booking of parlors. Such actions make children the laughing stock of the general public. 

Fathers might not get the attention that mothers get in terms of setting aside a day in the calendar for celebrations. But a father would appreciate it if a simple word is uttered in his name on this blessed day given that the thought behind it is genuine.