by Steve Doocy
“Do you have a flashlight?” the guy asked.
“Sorry,” Peter said, knowing that a flashlight was the kind of blunt object these types were always using on dummies who opened front doors to local outlaws.
Peter stood there fully prepared for the worst. Unbeknownst to the interloper, just before he opened the door, Peter had gone into the kitchen, where he’d grabbed the deadliest thing in our house, a Smith and Wollensky steak knife, the same one I lopped off the end of my finger with. At that moment, with the perplexed perpetrator bent over less than a yard from my son, Peter was gripping the wooden handle of the knife inside the front pocket of his North Face coat. One wrong sudden move and my son was ready to plunge it into the guy’s rib cage.
Then it happened!
The stranger fixed the Internet.
“Modem power cable burned out,” he announced, and within thirty seconds he replaced it with a new one from his pocket.
Peter didn’t know that that morning I’d begged the Internet service provider to send somebody over to fix it. The repair guy parked his truck at the back of our driveway so he wouldn’t block our cars, and he arrived in a T-shirt and not his uniform because he got called directly from a softball game.
“Next time don’t answer the door,” I pleaded during another lecture on personal safety, just relieved Peter didn’t know I kept our improvised explosive devices under the sink next to the Drano.
Now that I examine what he did, I’m relieved he didn’t forget momentarily that the cutter was in his pocket and sit on it.
“Excuse me, Fixit Guy, could you drive me to the hospital? I just impaled myself on the knife I was going to stab you with….”
Thank goodness, nothing bad happened, but I keep returning to the larger question: What was he thinking when he opened that door? I keep coming back to the same answer: Peter has been faithfully watching and studying me for twenty years, and upon further review, the steak knife thing was definitely something of which I was capable.
Monkey see, monkey do.
A chip off the old block.
Like father, like…you get the idea.
As I think about it, who needs Smith & Wesson when you’ve got Smith and Wollensky?
I read somewhere that sibling rivalry ends at age fifty, but parental worry has no expiration date. A dad’s job is never done. Fatherhood is a lifetime sentence, much like what Peter could have gotten if he had used that steak knife on the Verizon guy.
26
The List
What Every Father Must Teach His Child
Never drink anything out of a boot.
Giggle at something every day. Just know laughter is not the best medicine; medicine is the best medicine.
Be prepared, if you must use a public toilet; squat, hover, and flush with your foot.
When at an unfamiliar restaurant, always order the menu item that is featured in a box. If no box, order what the waitress had.
Don’t cry, but if you must, be brief.
Expect the unexpected. Who says Dustin Hoffman won’t join the cast of Hannah Montana?
Tell the truth, unless somebody is asking if his pants make him look fat.
When in a bar fight go for the eyes, figuratively not literally.
A yellow light at an intersection means slow down, and proceed with caution, after you check the mirror for cops.
Watch your language; if you say, “Nice rack,” you’d better be talking about the lamb.
When in doubt, call home.
Dad will always love you, even when a child asks why he has all those wrinkles and his breath smells like Jack cheese.
Hygiene is important, but only use the hand sanitizer discreetly so the world doesn’t know you’re a germ freak on a par with Michael Jackson.
Shakespeare said, “Neither a borrower nor a lender be”; I say, “Don’t rob a bank.”
Don’t live your life by a checklist. That’s silly.
THANK-YOUS AND SHOUT-OUTS
This is a book about fathers, and I must start by acknowledging a man who has been like a father to me and many at the Fox News Channel, Roger Ailes, who is not only the most powerful man in television news, but in reality a great dad. He has been my mentor for fifteen years; I love this man as much as one guy can love another without getting an apartment in the Village.
Years before Roger would return my phone calls, Beth Ailes saw something and hired me. Beth once had me host a parenting show that helped make me a much better dad and eventually led to the book that you are holding. Without her right now you’d probably be holding The O’Reilly Factor for Pets. Thank you, Beth.
To my TV brothers and sisters, Brian Kilmeade, Gretchen Carlson, Alisyn Camerota, and Andrew Napolitano, thank you for making it easier to get up every day at 3:27 A.M. Behind the scenes at Fox & Friends, Dave Brown, Gresham Striegel, Jennifer Williams, Maral Usefi, and Jennifer Cunningham, thank you for giving me the most lines of copy to read—it’s driving the others crazy!
To Bill Shine, Suzanne Scott, Joel Cheatwood, Woody Fraser, John Moody, Brian Lewis, Irena Briganti, Jack Abernethy, Dianne Brandi, Chris Silverstri, Cristina Cassese, Judy Laterza, and other Fox News big shots whom I have counted as friends in some cases for over two decades, thanks for everything. Please don’t turn on me now.
To the O’Reilly Factor squad, Mr. Bill, David Tabacoff, Amy Sohnen, Rob Monaco, and of course my cross-desk rival, Martha MacCallum, just know when I miss a quiz question, I’m just trying to look human.
To the coffee-guzzling, bagel-munching men and women of Studio E who work the dawn patrol, you’re marvelous; don’t ever change a thing, except the lighting. Jeisohn and Maureen, remember, nobody needs to know that Hannity uses a Lady Remington shaver.
You would be holding a mess of mimeographed musings on three-ring-binder paper if not for the supportive team of yes men and women I have at the publisher William Morrow. When editor par excellence Mauro DiPreta (screen name ieditnaked) suggested I write a book on fatherhood, I trusted his judgment and started writing even though in my heart I wanted to write a book on Canada’s professional women’s volleyball league.
Thanks as well to the rest of my team at HarperCollins, Lynn Grady, Jennifer Schulkind, Pamela Spengler-Jaffee, Richard Aquan, and the very big cheeses, Michael Morrison, Lisa Gallagher, and Jane Friedman, who’ll return my urgent pleading phone calls as soon as this album goes platinum.
To superagent Bob Barnett, who will read this single paragraph and bill me for a quarter hour, thank you for the advice not to sell the movie rights to Vivid Video.
Premiere Speakers Bureau helped coordinate my book tour and other promotional activities. Thanks to Duane Ward and his gang in Nashville for putting me in a rock star’s tour bus! When I pulled up to a Books-A-Million location, some woman thought the Eagles were onboard and threw me her panties. They didn’t fit so I threw them back.
Thank you to true friends who shared their ideas and stories: Peter and Blanche Johnson, Todd and Madeline Van Duren, Rodger and Beverly Rohde, Deb and Rodger Rohde Jr., Faith and Ray Van Duren, Jim and Mary Madormo, Greg Ciccone, Eileen and Bud Hansen, Judy and Mike Lee, Mary and Jack Vossler, J. R. and Laura Frank, Goldie Weisz and Sileshi Petro.
Thanks to my in-laws, Rob and Gwen Gerrity, Dub and Randa Gerrity, and Big Daddy Joe Gerrity.
The most sincere thanks go to my family, first and foremost my wife, Kathy, who is not only the best mother I have ever known and a loving, wonderful wife, but also one of the best partners a guy writing a fatherhood book could have, as she scribbled notes in the margins with verbatim quotes from the actual day these stories took place. You are a gem, and you’re all mine.
And of course to the three miracles who are the reason I am a father, Peter, Mary, and Sally. Thank you for being not just good kids, but funny, wise, thoughtful, and downright inspiring people.
To my sisters, Cathy, Lisa, Ann, and Jenny, and their families; the miles may separate us, but not in my heart.
An
d finally to my father, Jim, the man I hope to be when I grow up. Thank you for showing me the way.
Steve Doocy
New York City
2008
P.S.: Allow me to extend a special word to all who bought this book, got the CD audio book, or checked it out at your local library. I told readers of my first book that as a journalism student it was a lifelong dream to write a book that somebody would read to the very end. Thanks to you, that dream just came true.
About the Author
STEVE DOOCY is an Emmy Award–winning broadcaster and cohost of Fox & Friends on the Fox News Channel. He has earned reporting and writing awards from the Associated Press, Sigma Delta Chi, and the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences, and has worked at NBC, CBS, and Fox. He and his wife, Kathy, live just outside of New York City with their three children, who grow up over the course of these two hundred some-odd pages.
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Also by Steve Doocy
The Mr. & Mrs. Happy Handbook
Credits
Jacket design by Richard Aquan
Jacket photograph by Jan Cobb
Copyright
TALES FROM THE DAD SIDE. Copyright © 2008 by Steve Doocy. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
EPub © Edition SEPTEMBER 2008 ISBN: 9780061982002
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