Sometimes the world throws me a curve so low and so wild that it stuns me. I work with children and not just any children but those with real issues. Most issues are deepened, hidden, buried so far deep that it takes a negative event to bring them out. But that's the world we live and so I come come to an important reality that the father is around. Now I'm not taking about God, but I'm sure he too is a witness, But I'm speaking about men in the home and men knowing the images of their children, having the ability to speak to them, to hug them, to have a relationship him them. But yet the mother still calls me to raise their children. To understand this blog, you must understand what I do. I work one on one with young children and even teens. We set goals of better education, respect for parents, to clean their rooms. But as of late I've been receiving calls from a school asking for my help with my client. Day one, he refused to go to class, day two, he road his chair like a horse and refuse to behave in class. Day three, Tuesday, I will be in class with him, sitting next to him for three hours. And I know what you are thinking, his poor mother must be stressed with the situation, she is calling you apologising for the calls from school. But she appreciates your hard work, because he doesn't have a father in his life. Well no. I never received a call nor do I know if the mother, step father or biological father knows about the situation at school. When I was growing up I didn't have a father. Now that doesn't mean that I only saw my father on weekends, or that I saw him every six months, but I saw him 3 times in my life, I talked to him once. It wasn't even a conversation. My mother asked me if i knew how he was, and I said yes, my father. That's was it, that was my big man speech, that was talk that made me a man, that formed my man hood. At the time my father was a passing man, I could not see any features that resembles me, let alone any mannerism. I was 10 years. He died when i was 21. Now to say I didn't have a father figure would be wrong. My grandfather was my father, and he taught me respect, punctuality, responsibility and discipline. And so he became a man that I respect. The young man I work, he has a stepfather living with him, he also has a biological father that care about, but both man lack the ability to raise their son. They lack the tools, maturity and understanding of their roles. They are soul-less, using the mom for sexual pleasure, yet running from the responsibility of their actions. I don't know what happen between the time of my grandfather, (a self indulging alcoholic who raised 6 kids with his wife and continued to raised three kids without her.) and two decades later my father, but I pray, I practice and I push the ideal of father hood. Because even though our fathers are in the house, their souls are lost, they are gaps in our souls from the lack of fathers that must be filled.