Where Tatty Wears the Housecoat

Single fathers raising large families are not common. I am personally acquainted with only one other. Then again, we don’t advertise.

Lone fathers gain their position by the absence of a functioning mother. This means that even before death or divorce do them part, the father will already have been fulfilling both roles, frequently along with caring for a dysfunctional spouse. I paddled my own canoe for about 15 years, with only me and children in the canoe for the last eight. My children have very few fond memories of their mother in the traditional role, mostly restricted to their infancy.

Single parenting is challenging, but I managed quite easily considering the situation before I found myself on my own. Of course, friends, family, and particularly my rav were of tremendous assistance. It would have been difficult to manage without my support system.

By far the worst was girls’ clothes shopping. As every mother knows, it is impossible to find clothes for girls. From a male perspective, the atmosphere in the female section of any goyish clothing store is most unpleasant for a heimish man, while heimish ladies clothing outlets were quite amusing. When I walked in, all eyebrows would rise and conversation would die mid-sentence. The proprietors came running to give me priority service; they were genuinely sympathetic, but I did scare the customers away.