You Tube Videos are Better Than a Deadbeat Dad

My son’s father has been a deadbeat for eighteen years. That has never been a secret in my home.
 
Raised by a single mother myself, I knew that a father wasn’t necessary to have a happy, honest childhood. My mother never lied to my sisters or I; and I carried that same lesson with me into motherhood. There was no need for sugar coating.
 
It was incredibly easy to be honest in the studio apartment my son and I shared when he was a toddler. The living space (also known as the bedroom, dining room, and kitchen) was unbelievably tiny. There was no room to store extra blankets or toys; there certainly wasn’t any room to hide secrets or a daddy.
 
We didn’t build an imaginary daddy in our heads, drawn in crayon on construction paper as if he were off on war duty or sailing the oceans of the world. He was never an astronaut on a faraway planet or a doctor healing sick children in the outskirts of other countries. He was a deadbeat, living mere miles away, in my son’s hometown.
 
Outrageous as this could sound to others, the absence of a father didn’t impact the way we lived. In truth, we didn’t even notice he was missing. My son and I had fun. We shared Happy Meals from McDonald’s and went to the movies to catch all the latest Superhero films. We wore the same cartoon character t-shirts and watched the newest installment of Power Rangers together. It was always a kick for my son that I had the same name as the Pink Power Ranger.
 
When it came time for my teenage son to learn to drive, he taught himself from YouTube videos (I never learned to drive stick shift and couldn’t assist). When he went to his first prom during junior year of high school, YouTube videos were there to help teach him how to properly construct the perfect bowtie.
 
It may sound awful that videos and fast food could replace a human being, but they did. I will go out on a very bold limb and make this statement: they did a much better job, too.

Kimberly Payne is a writer living in Reno, Nevada – a much smaller, envious rival of Las Vegas. She spends time with family and books, not in that order. You can also find her on Twitter.