MY DRIVE TO BE A DAD
“Being an artist, I believe I put a lot of stuff in the world already, and I know none of them are as great as my children will be.”
Sanford Biggers, Interdisciplinary Artist
When I first found out I was going to be a father. It was shock and a little bit of anxiety, a lot of excitement, a lot of questions. I know the first two people I told were my parents. I told them immediately. I was happy for them to become grandparents, and I was hopeful for some advice going into it, even though it had been so long ago for them.
COMFORT IN BALANCE
Growing up was a strange time. The majority of my friends were in split families, so they weren't necessarily with their fathers all the time. For a long time, I was reluctant to even say that I was still living with my mother and father. This was the 80’s, and this was when divorce not only gained popularity but acceptance. My father himself grew up without his father, but he had three brothers. I grew up in a family where there were a lot of strong women, but there were also a lot of strong men.
My father was a neurosurgeon, so his schedule meant that he was on call sometimes. There would be maybe a couple of days at a time where I wouldn't see him, depending on when he would get home and when I would be leaving. But his presence was always felt, either from my mom referencing him or saying, ‘when your father gets home, you can do this X, Y, and Z.’ I think that the absence was also very important to know for me as a kid, so I didn't become too dependent or let's say, clingy, but at the same time appreciated that I had the balance of both. The synchronization of having a mother and father who both respected each other and gave each other a wide berth of how to educate us and help us as kids informs who I am today.
One of the things that stands out to me is that although he was a neurosurgeon, my father was a Renaissance man. He really was interested in the brain just as an artist would be interested in a sculpture or a mound of clay. He thought that the brain was an analogy for infinite creativity, infinite possibilities, and as interested as he was in science and medicine, he was also interested in music, art, and poetry. He believed a well-rounded person had an interest in all of those and pursued them to the degree of their desire. My personal evolution has been influenced by those polarities.
THE ELEVATION
There's a saying my father used to give me, and I can only assume he gave that to my older brother and sister, too, in their private moments. He would always say to me, “You will be the best of us. You can and will be the best of us.” I have to say, every morning when I talk to my children, to my daughter and my son, I feel that about them.
I think it's really important to expose my children to as much as possible and give them the freedom to start, to decide the things that make sense for themselves. Parenthood is an opportunity to look at the successes and failures of your own making, of who you are as an individual, so that you don't imprint those negative qualities onto your kids, and that you capitalize on the positive qualities that you inherently have. It is also an opportunity to redo a few things that might not have gone the way you wanted as a child, so as much as they are open canvases, blank canvases, parents are as well. We provide guidance, but we're learning every step of the way. And I think that's part of evolution as an individual and as a family.
UNBOUND
One of the things that I think about a lot in terms of my kids is for them never to limit themselves or have to turn down their shine to appease anybody else. I want to instill my children with our past but also bolster them and strengthen them to make a better future. As a parent, you have to be flexible to understand. You only know so much, and your children help teach you as well as you teach them.
Every day is a new realization that they may already be better than I ever could be. I want them to keep that light in their eyes and in their heart, because I know they can be. I want to teach them to live without borders, live without limitations for themselves, not based on society or country.
As a father, my love languages are communication and support. When I say support, I don't mean just, you know, a general, you know, definition of it. I mean, literally, we're going to read this book, we're going to write down the words we don't know, we're going to go over them. We're going to have fun with that.
Again, I think, you know, I was very fortunate to have a father who was very accomplished, but was always able to put in perspective that true strength is an admission of some vulnerability. He never presented to me this sort of, you know, larger than life, macho, alpha male that was infallible, never upset, stoic all the time. What he did show me was that to be strong is to actually embrace the vulnerable and embrace the strengths and realize that they feed off of each other. The vulnerability becomes a strength when you find ways to subvert it, and the strength is knowing that you can only control so much. Those are, you know, serious lives, life lessons that I carry with me.
THE LEARNING CURVE
I enjoy being with my kids and enjoy the learning; the difficulties, them seeing that I am perfect and fallible all at once, and knowing that we all are.
You know, with parenthood and fatherhood. We think it's all about plans, strategy, and preparedness, but the reality is that this is a work in progress, and it's day by day. I think those moments of joy come when your kids surprise you, question you, maybe challenge you, or make you laugh. Those are the moments that take you off script where you realize that whether you want to or not, you've brought into the world an individual who will think and do for themselves. They will challenge you. They will push you. They will make you better.
Being a father has taught me several more shades of love. It's beyond self-love and the love of a partner. It is a love that is unconditional. Even when they make you upset and when they make you happy, you realize that everything you do has to operate from a place of love. It also gives you the opportunity to go back into your own life and figure out the moments when you didn't necessarily give yourself love, and how you need to address some of those things in order to give a certain type of love to your children, and not just to give to them, to help them grow, but to model them so that they know how to love when they grow up; it's complicated, it's multi-layered, and it's a work in progress day by day. I think one of the gifts of parenthood is to find that vulnerability and access the opportunity to take every day to learn more about yourself and to be a better person for those around you.
MESSAGE TO MY FATHER
To my father, I'd like to say thank you. Thank you for the model you set. Thank you for showing me your vulnerability, your strength. Thank you for letting my mom be as present and prevalent in my upbringing as she was. Thank you for providing the love that allowed her to stay home and be there in support of all the difficult things that I'm going through now. I look back and appreciate the fact that you and her have figured out to bestow upon me and my brother and sister, and hopefully I can do the same for my son and daughter. I hold you as a very high model.
MY DRIVE
Being an artist, I believe I put a lot of stuff in the world already, and I know none of them are as great as my children will be. That awareness drives me. And those days when I don't feel like getting up or getting out of the bed and going out there and making things, I realize that sometimes it's not for me, but it's also to provide the model, the wherewithal, and the consistency that I hope that they can absorb and observe.
To my children, you are infinite. You are everything. You are limitless. Enjoy the ride.
CREDITS:
Interview: Cori Murray @corimurray
Photography: Kadeem Johnson @kjohn_lasoul
Creative Direction: Andrew Dosunmu @shot_by_andrew_dosunmu
Editor: Oriana Soddu
ICON MANN thanks Toyota USA and HOT 97 for their support and partnership.
