Columnist Leonard Pitts Jr., wrote recently of standing watch over the “River of Goo” that metaphorical crossover time when clever, energetic, self-confident daughters reach adolescence and become someone their dads never knew before.
Where once they raced from place to place, they now slouch along sidewalks. Where once they eagerly raised their hands to answer questions in class, they sit silently hoping the boys won’t think they’re too smart. Where once they played joyfully with abandon, they now lurk dolefully in front of mirrors, comparing themselves to models who quit playing (and eating) long ago.
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I remember well the River of Goo. Girls of my generation reached it around age 11 or 12, maybe earlier now. We, too, sulked and slouched and starved ourselves trying to be someone desirable. Girls were envying others’ flat tummies long before feminists revived Ophelia to decry female oppression. So there’s nothing new about the River of Goo, only our attention to it.
The attention is good, if talking about girls’ loss of self-esteem during adolescence mends a few souls. But talking about self-esteem by way of school programs and role models and societal stereotypes is missing the boat. The River of Goo is navigable, but girls need a good boatswain and his name is Dad.
No single influence is more important to a girl’s self-esteem and her future than her father. Studies support this notion, including a recent one out of England by a researcher named Adrienne Katz. In her “Can-Do Girls” report, published last year, Katz found that girls with the highest self-esteem and self-confidence had a strong father-daughter relationship.
But my belief in the importance of fathers isn’t scientific; it’s personal. My father raised me from the time I was 3, after my mother died. Here’s what I know about fathers and daughters and the River of Goo.
My father didn’t raise me to be a girl. He just raised me. He clocked me when I ran and praised me when I beat the neighborhood boys. He rarely told me I was pretty, even though every father thinks his daughter is. What I remember most is his telling me: “Looks aren’t important. It’s what you do that matters. Now go read a book.”
“Look it up,” he always said when I asked a word’s meaning. He never would tell me himself. To look it up was to learn it.
“Do everything you can,” he said. “Go everywhere, experience everything.” I left home at 17 and never went home again except to visit.
“Think for yourself,” he said. Once I was a teen, my father never told me what I could or couldn’t do. He told me his opinion, then dropped the burden of decision in my lap. Of course, I always did what he wanted. How could I not? He was right.
“Be slow to know,” he said about boys. “Don’t give yourself away, hold your cards close, keep yourself to yourself.” He taught me to play poker so I could keep a straight face, and to shoot a gun, so I could if I had to.
He took me on trips to learn to dine and dance. “Be a good listener,” he said. That’s all a man wants. “Leave the first time he raises a hand.” He’ll do it again.
“Peel the potatoes, Catalina,” he said almost every night. He was Irish; I’m a master potato peeler. While I peeled, he cooked dinner and we talked about whatever came to mind. Can I do this? Should I do that?
“You can do anything,” he said. Funny, I believed him.
I can’t speak to the value of mothers to their daughters. I don’t recommend growing up without one. But I can’t fathom growing up without a father. They speak differently to daughters than mothers do. They allow you to take risks; they teach you your worth in the presence of men. They say things like “Chin up, Catalina, keep your eye on the ball.”
I worry about the many girls growing up without fathers owing to divorce, divisive custody arrangements or the misguided decisions of some women to become single mothers. I’d wager that behind most women who successfully crossed the River of Goo was a man, and his name was Dad.
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