By Douglas V. Gibbs
As Father’s Day 2026 winds down for the evening, I’ve appreciated the many offers of “Happy Father’s Day” throughout this lovely Sunday. There were a couple videos about fathers at church which brought me to tears, a fantastic message by our pastor (and a baby dedication of his first grandchild), a lunch after church with my wife at a place we only visit every once in a while, and then I cooked three of my favorite things so that I could have the perfect Father’s Day dinner – a dinner of which my body a few hours later told me it was not thrilled about – Lasagna, Cheese Potatoes and Stuffed Bell Peppers. Apart they are great, but apparently my tummy is not a fan of when the three are combined into one meal.
The videos at church hit me hard. The first one portrayed a series of young adults (and a couple times, children) with their dads simply offering what they appreciate about their father. Then, the follow up was the father telling his kid what he appreciated about them. In many cases, God was offered as a part of the answer. “I appreciate how much you love God.”
The second video, saved for the end of the service, was a little funny, with a guy sitting on a pier fishing beside an older man, telling his dad he loves him. Except his companion was not his dad. It was his uncle that he was practicing on. Then, after the uncle tells him it was a good message, the young adult slid across the pier to where his father was sitting with his fishing pole in his hand, and then as the young man tried to tell his dad the same thing, he kept messing up the words as if he didn’t really know how to talk to his dad. The dad responds, “I know what you are trying to say,” and the son responds, “You do?” “Yeah,” says the dad, “I could hear you practicing on your uncle. It’s not that far away.” We laughed, and as with the first video, tears filled my eyes and fell down my cheeks.
I cried because I was looking back on my own life. I was a young father. My son was born before my nineteenth birthday. My wife and I got married right out of high school. My oldest grandson is now four months older than I was when I found out my girlfriend was pregnant, I married her, and I shipped off to boot camp across the country and was gone for the first six months of our marriage. I departed my young sweet wife fearful of what came next, and returned to a woman about six months pregnant and angry I had been gone for six months. Then, based on when our son was born, I figured out (of which she admitted to me, later), she had been trying to get pregnant, and believed she was with child the moment her monthly cycle was a couple weeks late, hoping to keep me from leaving her to go to college. In other words, when she told me she was pregnant, it was a hunch, but she didn’t know for sure. Based on when our son was born, she likely got pregnant a couple weeks before our marriage date.
When we got married and I signed up to get into the United States Navy, the family (on both sides) was livid. College was not something members of our extended family typically were able to accomplish. Due to grades that finally began catching up to my capabilities the last two years of high school, and my long-distance running athletics, a few colleges were trying to recruit me. I was told I threw it all away. Anger was thrown at me from all directions. But, I loved my new wife so much – and, it felt like the right thing to do. With the pregnancy thing and all, it was the responsible thing to do. One thing I have always believed in is that a man must always take responsibility for his actions. He doesn’t find excuses, and he doesn’t blame his situation on others. A real man takes action to deal properly with the consequences that come his way as a result of his actions. In the end, our lives are the result of our own decisions. So, I took action based on the consequences of my decisions, doing what I believed to be the right course of actions.
I spent four years in the United States Navy, spent time on two ships, and despite my schooling as a personnelman, on the first ship I never worked in the ship’s office. I was first assigned mess-deck duties, and then since they were short deck seamen underway, I was a deck-ape like the rest of them which included underway watches… the latter turning out to be miserable and very cool at the same time. Watch-standing underway outside in the middle of the night is a miserable thing. But, a part of watch-standing, as you rotate around the seven watch duty stations each hour, is helmsman. In short, I got to drive the ship. The Officer-of-the-Deck, of course would tell me where to steer, but having one’s hands on that big wheel while the ship is crashing through the waves was an exhilarating thing for me.
After the end of my military service, which included an injury I received that disallowed me from reenlisting, I worked for a credit union, a city government, a life insurance office, construction and a sand and gravel truck company – whatever it took to fulfill my responsibilities as a dad and husband. I worked hard, putting food on the table and paying for the roof over my family’s heads without ever complaining. In construction, the job I held the longest, I hated the work, but I carried out my duties with joy in my heart as God would expect me to – never complaining except on occasion to my wife when I laid upon my bed in pain at night. My body hurt from my injuries in the Navy, but generally I said nothing. I grinned, and I worked as hard as I could so that I could take care of my family.
My wife also worked, but I always did what I could to make sure I earned enough money to take care of the family. I didn’t care what I wanted to do for a job – I did what I had to do in order to make sure enough money was earned. And I worked in construction (and for a Sand and Gravel company after the 2008 economic meltdown that killed my construction hours) until my health got me to the point that I could not work a day-job anymore. Until that point, my income was always enough, and my wife’s income was the icing on top. After my body said it couldn’t pull it off anymore, my wife took over, at that point making enough money to keep us sustained. It was then that I began teaching Constitution Classes to adults and home-school kids U.S. History, U.S. Government and Economics.
Over the years of our marriage, my wife and I had two children: the boy who was born while I was in the Navy, and a daughter a couple years after I got out. My wife was a modern mom who had earned a psychology degree along the way and had both feet firmly planted in The World’s way of thinking. My role as dad, as far as I was concerned, meant that my role was only to work hard and make sure nobody had any worries financially. I was to work hard, and my wife was there to mother them and run the household.
Growing up I was a man of faith, but my wife had pretty much abandoned her upbringing and had no interest in church. When we married, rather than be the love of my life, she became an adversary, and I was too young, too naïve, and too willing not to rock the boat that I pretty much had decided the inside of the house was her domain. I was not mature enough to understand how to deal with the situation – not because of my worldly youth as much as the fact that I failed to go to God with it.
I went to church when I could, typically against her wishes and with a verbal argument attached. I tried to help the kids with homework or give them fatherly advice, but all of that was met with, “Don’t talk to the kids. The home is my responsibility. Going to work is yours.” I slithered into my assigned corner, and never thought that it might be a good idea to force her to believe otherwise.
As a result, I don’t have the kind of relationship with my children I wished I had. I was the economic provider, and nothing more. And that is why while at church on Father’s Day in 2026 after watching the two videos I was in tears. Father’s Day has always been just another day. It is something I go through the motions with every year – just like I went through the motions with church during the first part of my marriage, rather than properly dying unto myself and giving it to The Lord.
Rather than respond, or call to God, I reacted and made the situation worse. I yelled, and I screamed, and looking back it looked more like a temper-tantrum than a father trying to do what was best for his family. In short, when I look back, I feel regret because I didn’t get it. I didn’t understand that the whole point of Father’s Day… the whole point of being a father… is a godly one. Being the spiritual leader of one’s household.
I never fully understood that the act of being a father is not the worldly extremes I was attempting to emulate from what I had seen. It is definitely not supposed to be the world’s version of a soft little man oozing with feminine emotion, or a tough guy with his chest stuck out knocking the sense out of anyone who he felt disrespected him. It’s a balance somewhere between based on the examples not of earthly men, but of our Father who Created us. And the funny thing is, I never understood that fully until about three years ago when my wife had an epiphany about our marriage, and Jesus Christ, and joined me at my side as a Christian who puts it all in the very capable hands of The Lord.
At our thirty-eight year mark she began to see things differently, and by the approach to our thirty-ninth year the truth began filling her thoughts. During a trip to Washington D.C. where I was to be one member of a group in a ceremony to read the Declaration of Independence at the Jefferson Memorial on Independence Day she revealed her growth to me, and began asking questions. She revealed to me that she didn’t truly know me, and operated based on assumptions fed to her from outside sources. She apologized for the previous four decades, as did I, and from that point our marriage did a wonderful thing.
Since then our journey to the Lord’s Mercy, Grace, and Loving Forgiveness has been remarkable. We have become the couple I’ve always wished for, and I feel like we have finally fully reached the potential of our relationship as a couple, and our relationship with The Lord.
So, on Father’s Day 2026 when those videos were played at church, I cried not because of everything I have just told you. It wasn’t about regrets, per se. I cried because over the last few years I have finally come to fully understand how I wasn’t the spiritual leader of my household when I was younger, and now my children navigate life along a more difficult journey partly because of that. I didn’t minister to my wife, nor did I make sure my kids were in church every Sunday. I failed to be the kind of man that God wants us to be – a man of Faith and carrying out fatherhood as He Created it – not as the world claims it ought to be.
I tell this story not to reveal my personal past, and I definitely am not one to worry and dwell on “would-a, should-a, could-a” scenarios. The past is the past, and I hope our children come to their own joyful epiphanies, be it because of something I said to them, or otherwise.
I lay this out for you not to reveal my own personal business, but hopefully to provide a lesson. For those of you men out there, the path to being the father for your children you wish to be begins with your Father. Not your earthly father, per se, but your Father Who Art in Heaven. He is the example, and his instructions are on the pages of Scripture. Be the man He wants you to be. Find the balance between the hard-working provider and the man who takes time to understand and be there – armed with the Word of God.
God Bless, and Happy Father’s Day.
— Political Pistachio Conservative News and Commentary
