It happened again. The thing that happens when you plan something and God laughs. Myles had been sick pretty much all week, and we thought this was just one of those times when your kid goes to daycare, picks up germs, brings them home, and gets better in two days.

Nope, not this time. This time Myles wasn’t himself for almost a week, and on Friday, just when we thought he was finally getting better, the daycare called us to come get him because he still just wasn’t being himself they said. I left work early and found him in the front office, knocked out on his nap mat. I picked him up and his body was so warm, and he looked at me with those big, beautiful eyes and said, “Daddy, I do not feel well.”

Long story short, we ended up in urgent care, and they tested for all the things that make you wonder: did he pick up something traveling the globe in the last three hours since we dropped him off, or are those toddlers at his daycare whipping up something nasty at nap time? They sent the drugs to the pharmacy, the one he loves—Amoxicillin—and I wonder if toddlers all love this pink medicine so much they would whip up a bacterial infection just to get some, because when we mention we got bubblegum medicine, he puts his fist up and smiles.

So this is meetup number four, and Mom and I make the call to stop the spread and keep Myles home. Which means I show up to the meetup alone. And since I don’t have the star of the show in tow, I am on time. I walk in, and Ms. Carla—the librarian, and arguably the co-star of this whole thing—doesn’t even say hello. She just looks at me and asks, “Where is Myles?” I tell her there was an incident at the toddler lab, but he is on Amoxicillin now, so he’s all good. She looks at me and nods like she understands.

Another dad is already there, and he’s without his kids too. His name is D, and he works for this really cool company called FiddleSticks Music, where they have music classes for toddlers and babies. Ms. Carla told me months ago she was going to get them to come.

I’ve met D before, so when I see him, I’m happy because I know the kids are in for a treat. But I’m also a little sad that we are both kidless. I wonder if his kids were whipping something up at the lab too. He tells me his kids turn savage when they watch him play and teach, so he didn’t bring them along. I tell him I understand. One time, I went to Myles’ class to read one of his favorite books, and he told all the kids to stay back from his daddy. I hate to admit it, but those kinds of moments are a two-year-old’s way of saying “I love you.” Love is a verb.

I tell D next time he comes, he gets to come just as a dad—no guitar—so he can experience it all for himself too.

It’s a little after 10, and a couple of dads start to show up. One is my cousin, which surprises me because I only had to ask him once. Another is a dad from the daycare I’ve been telling about the meetup. Another is a dad whose friend invited him last time, and he came back again on his own. And then there’s Z, who has been at every meetup since the beginning.

It was a small, intimate group, and something about that always feels special. I tell the dads I know I can do a better job promoting this, but I love the intimacy of it. I know one day the room will be so full the library will be bursting at the seams with fathers and children. But for now, I sit in this moment and relish it—because even in a small room like this, it feels like enough.

D calls us over to the carpet and starts leading songs that remind me how beautiful this space is, even if it’s just a few of us. He’s there with his guitar, singing, and a part of me softens watching the dads with their little ones in their laps, singing along and playing with all the instruments.

This is what the meetup is about—just a bunch of dads and their kids. And while I know some of the dads here aren’t used to this, because I’m not either, I love how the meetup forces us, as men, to get down low with our kids and allows us to be soft in ways that aren’t often seen, or sometimes, sadly, not even valued.

Because even if the world is on fire, this hour and a half is a call to joy, to connect, and to be soft with ourselves and with our children. I wish men didn’t always have to be hard—that they could leave every burden at the door and just be like their children. Just laugh, smile, and for a little while, be in a room where everything feels alright.

Every month I think I’m creating something for our children, when in reality, I’m creating something for their fathers too.

My favorite moment from the meetup is watching mothers walk by with their kids. I tell them about what we are building here, and they say, “Don’t worry, my husband will be at the next one.”

If you are a dad reading this, you’re doing a great job. You matter so much so much to world, but especially to the little person who calls you Dad.

Thank you for showing up. And if no one has told you they love you today, I do.

The next meetup is on May 23rd, and I can’t wait.

See ya’ll soon,

Marc

Read about the last meetup here

Dear Myles,

The last time your grandmother visited us in Alabama, you were not walking yet. As a matter of fact, your neck, still loose, needed our fingers resting behind your head for support. I miss how your whole little head could fit in the palm of my hand, and your body, across my chest, safe in my arms. And I wonder if this is how God felt when He made us—crafted from dirt, molded in His hands, safe in His arms.

I remember the last time your grandmother was here, you had no words, and now you call for her: “Grandma, Grandma!” on your pretend phone. On FaceTime, I can tell she wants to visit. I can tell she’s tired of watching her grandson grow through a screen because frame rates and pixels could never do justice. I can see how, each time she sees you cry, she wants to jump through the glass separating you two and just scoop you into her arms.

My mother’s tongue has betrayed her too many times. How she could never bend it enough to sound just right over the phone when talking to bill collectors, so she used to pass it to me, because I just so happened to be born here. How people have assumed, because her words sound like they’ve been salted, marinated, and cured, that she is less intelligent. And even though she can speak three languages, one for every head of the colonizer’s trinity, somehow she is still not articulate enough.

It’s one thing to be Black. It’s another thing when you are a Black immigrant, and a whole other thing when you are Black, immigrant, and Haitian, with an accent. When you know the land you came from is rich in beauty and history, but White men do what they have always done, and now home is called a shithole, where everyone who comes from there is reduced to eating cats and dogs.

I do not know what to tell Grandma. She is resilient, and I am a believer. My faith tells me, “Fear not them that kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul.” But how do I hide my fear that they will send her to a place she does not know? These men who play god desperately want to kill the soul. Even though I know I am safe in the hands of God, safe in His arms, my present fate lies in the hands of men playing eeny, meeny, miny, moe. She is scared to fly, but wants to see her grandson. I want her to, but I am scared to lose my mother.

Love,

Daddy

If you can’t commit to a monthly subscription, but still want to support Myles’ college plan, here is my Buy Me a Coffee page.

And if you are on Substack, please restack this letter and recommend it so I can share this love with the world.

Want more of Myles’ Letters?

• They Say When Man Makes a Plan, God Laughs

• Myles met his Grandfather in Brooklyn, NY

• Read about Our first Father’s Day.

• A video about beautiful backgrounds: Tell Them Where You're From

• Read about My Wife’s Love Affair - It’s exactly what you don’t think

• Have you ever been Cooking in the Bathroom kind of tired?

• Check out Carrying the Gift, Holding the Love

We were running late to this month’s meetup. I was trying to get one of those boxes of coffee from Starbucks, and even though I did my best to order ahead, lo and behold, I was sitting in the drive-thru with a screaming toddler in the back asking why we were in a tunnel and not at the library. Myles has become used to going to the meetups now, excited to see new people and familiar faces. Me, the anxiety of whether anyone is going to show up and what I am going to do this time with a bunch of dads still waxes and never wanes. I called the library to let them know we were running late. And when we finally arrived, Ms. Carla, the librarian, had that same smile she always has when we walk in. She let us know two dads were already there and showed us the room she set up for us.

The last two meetups were in the kids’ area, an open space with books and toys, but dads spent a quarter of the time talking and the rest herding their kids to make sure they didn’t leave the library. Last month, Ms. Carla said she wanted to give us a meeting room at no cost and would set up the room for us and the little ones. Setup was an understatement. Ms. Carla set up about six stations, from huge Legos to walking tiles that looked like the stuff in lava lamps when you stepped on them, along with arts and crafts, a chalk area, and a bouncy house. She even had a story ready for all of us who were there. It was not just one of those stories where she’s reading and showing pictures. No, I am talking felt boards, puppets, and actions, and the kind of story telling that captivated even the squirmiest toddler. And while Myles sat in my lap and laughed and pointed, while she told the story, it reminded me how much the meetup is as much for him and me as it is for the other dads.

I started a new job this past week. The kind of job where I have to clock in and out now, the kind of job where I remember why people are so thankful for Fridays—and now I’m just as grateful for them too. Time feels different because I’m not able to drop him off like I used to, and sometimes I’m not able to pick him up from school either. After my first week of coming home every day, I sat in the car a little longer, trying to prepare myself to give him and my wife everything I had left in my tank, even though I felt empty. But as he laughed in my lap while Ms. Carla told the story, I felt full. The kind of full where the exhaustion briefly melts away and you hear Lauryn Hill in the background singing “Nothing Even Matters.”

After the story, the kids played and the dads talked. And even though this meetup was probably the smallest, it was exactly what it needed to be. Because dads weren’t too worried about their kids wandering off, we actually got to sit down and play a board game. I think back to how much I worried all month about what I was going to do for this meetup. But the meetup took care of itself. Sometimes we just get to show up and be a part of something. And maybe that’s my role in all this. Having a desire for something doesn’t mean I have to be the sustainer. What if I just get to show up, and people like Ms. Carla, who set up the space for us, or the dad who brought a game, or last time when a dad brought coffee—what if people are actively waiting to help us? The meetup is a beautiful reminder that we never have to do anything alone.

If you are a dad reading this, you’re doing a great job. You matter so much so much to world, but especially to the little person who calls you Dad.

Thank you for showing up. And if no one has told you they love you today, I do.

The next meetup is on April 25th and I can wait.

See ya’ll soon,

Marc

Read about the last meetup here

Dear Myles, 

on nights I cannot sleep 

all the ways
i’ve fallen short 
keep me awake 

i toss 
i turn 
i wonder 			
if this bed 
be my casket 
this room 
my mausoleum 

and before I know it 
dark gives way to light 

i hear “daddy”
and remember 
I have one more day 
to make it right 

Love, 
Daddy 

If you can’t commit to a monthly subscription, but still want to support Myles’ college plan, here is my Buy Me a Coffee page.

And if you are on Substack, please restack this letter and recommend it so I can share this love with the world.

Leave a comment

More Letters to Myles:

• They Say When Man Makes a Plan, God Laughs.

• Myles met his Grandfather in Brooklyn, NY

• Read about Our first Father’s Day.

• A video about beautiful backgrounds: Tell Them Where You’re From.

• Read about My Wife’s Love Affair - It’s exactly what you don’t think

• Have you ever been Cooking in the Bathroom kind of tired?

• Check out Carrying the Gift, Holding the Love

I write letters to my son, Myles, sharing my journey as a first-time dad and spreading the love I didn't experience myself. If you’ve been here before — thank you for coming back. If you’re new here, here are some good places to start.

• "Wait—Who Taught My Son the 'F' Word?"

• Good dad, decent husband, bad friend

• Am I a Good Dad, or is the Bar Just Really Low?

Last week I shared with you all an interview I did with my friend where I talked about my experience in therapy. This letter to Myles is about a small moment that set me on the journey of seeking one. My hope, as always, is that one day he will get a better sense of who I am—and who I was. My deeper hope is that, through these words, more men will seek support when we need it. And not just any support, but the kind that helps us feel whole, because we are worth it.

Dear Myles,

Sometimes we treat the people we love like our dirty laundry; we bring them our soiled linens, hoping and expecting they will help clean both the clothes and the feelings that stained them. I’m not really sure if this metaphor works, because here’s the problem: people in our lives aren’t laundromats. In fact, the people in our lives already have their soil linens too. It’s too much for them to wash both their shit and yours.

I had a hard day of teaching. The kind of day where you want to go home and tell your best friend about it. Your mother and I are in bed, and I start telling her what’s been bothering me. She says she can’t right now. She’s upset with me about something else that I can’t even recall.

We argue. This is too much for her to wash. She can’t put aside her own feelings to deal with mine, because not every machine can handle every load, and frankly she shouldn’t have to. Some people can handle a few shirts and socks. But when you come in carrying blankets soaked from a storm, you might need an industrial machine.

It took me a long time to realize she couldn’t hold space for me at that moment. Not only because she was upset, but because she is human. And it’s not her job to wash my laundry. [This metaphor doesn’t work because you don’t need a degree to wash clothes. But I’m too far away to turn back now.]

I left the bed and went out to the car to call a friend. I scrolled through my contacts and realized at that moment, I didn’t feel like I could call anyone. It’s not that I didn’t have friends. It’s that everyone wants to wash clothes the way they think they should be washed: warm, cold, gentle cycle, bleach, fabric softener. They want to give advice, tell you what to do and how to do it. Sometimes we don’t even know what the right wash is, or what we need, but we know we can’t carry the pile alone.

I needed something delicate. [Wait, maybe this metaphor does work.] I knew I had a problem because the only person I knew I could talk to, someone I felt safe with, was my friend E, who was also the principal at the school where I was teaching. Yes, I called my boss. I called her with tears in my eyes and explained how I was feeling. I felt almost embarrassed, because here I was calling my boss.

Commercial break: I hope you know this wasn’t some ordinary school. The women I met while teaching there not only taught me to teach, they also taught me it was okay to feel and be vulnerable as a Black man. In fact, that made me special as a teacher.

So instead of calling HR, E listened to me with such ease and love as I showed her some deep stains. It was about 11pm on a school night, but she made it feel like Sunday morning, like she didn’t have anywhere else to go. She knew how to wash these kinds of clothes, because she went to a dry cleaner!

Ok, this metaphor doesn’t work.

“You need a friend,” she told me. She didn’t mean someone like your mother, or someone already in our life who gives us advice. She was talking about someone you pay to wash your clothes, but they’re experts at washing and getting those deep stains out. The ones that have been there since childhood. The ones we walk around with without even realizing our clothes are soiled. The ones that carry trauma, sometimes generationally.

It’s been three years since that night. And since then, I’ve been working with someone who knows how to handle the toughest stains in my life. He has a PhD in poop stains and countless hours of experience working with the kinds of dirt and spots the world throws at Black men, because he is a Black man too.

When I tell him about my anxiety, we talk about what that feels like in my body. How our feelings are natural, and that when we are aware of them we can choose differently. When I tell him about the people in my life who hurt me, we talk about how sometimes our body responds as if they are still in the room, and the work we do in therapy is reminding ourselves they are not. When I tell him I’m worried about becoming the kind of father my father was, he reminds me that I get to be my own person, that I get to outgrow what I was given, and that I don’t have to wear what was handed down to me.

He holds space for me as if my clothes are the only ones in the washer, carefully treating each stain without judgment or hurry.

I don’t think this laundry metaphor works, but I’ve come too far and I must finish it now.

After 3 years in therapy here what I’ve learned:

Feelings need sorting.

Some things you can throw in with everything else,

but some things bleed if you are not careful.

Childhood trauma is like a red sock in a load of whites.

Myles, after you were born, I knew that I had to stick with my therapist for as long as I could.

I don’t want to pretend my clothes are clean. Some people hand the pile to the person they love most. Therapy taught me the pile is mine, but I don’t have to wash it alone.

And maybe love is not washing someone's clothes for them. Love is helping them learn how to wash their own.

Love,

Daddy

P.S Today is also my birthday and I’m spending the morning reading to your class 🎂

If you can’t commit to a monthly subscription, but still want to support Myles’ college plan, here is my Buy Me a Coffee page.

And if you are on Substack, please restack this letter and recommend it so I can share this love with the world.

Let me know your thoughts:

1. Do you sort your laundry or throw everything in together?

2. Who helps you carry the pile when it gets too heavy to hold alone?

3. For my brothers, do you find it hard to ask for help?

4. Ever had a colleague that supported you way beyond the job?

Leave a comment

I want to tell you I love this kind of wonder, a child who acts like every morning, the light that bleeds into his room is something he sees for the first time, but truthfully, I wish he would just stay in bed a little longer. We were up late last night because we had friends over. And every time, where our logic says if we sleep late, he will wake up later, toddler logic says “na.”

As soon as our friends left, my wife started the bedtime routine, and I ripped open a pack of thank-you cards I got from the dollar store earlier that day. For weeks, I had been trying to figure out what to do for the next dad meetup. Again, the same thoughts that circled around my brain last month came up. How do you plan something that will keep a bunch of dads engaged—especially with a bunch of toddlers running around?

Earlier in the week I began thinking about what I needed in this season of fatherhood. I thought about how hard some days feel: working full time and trying to be a present father, husband, and friend . I thought about every time we thought we had potty training down pat, wet underwear reminds me just not yet. I thought about the kind of math that happens when 1 +1 becomes 3, or how when my son was born I started to feel like I didn’t matter as much to anyone anymore, and how I wish someone told me I wasn’t alone. How I started to process this shift by writing to my son, when I really just needed someone to tell me “it’s going to be okay.”

Last night, after our friends left and my son and wife were asleep, I sat down with those thank-you cards and began writing the notes I wish someone would have taken the time to write to me—reminders of worth, reminders that fathers are loved even when they do not feel like it, reminders that sometimes showing up gets to be enough. I wrote that we are good fathers, even on the days when we struggle to believe it. I finished writing around midnight, and for the first time in weeks I slept through the night.

When Myles and I got to the library that morning, Ms. Carla was beaming. She was excited to see me, and even more excited to see Myles, who had missed the last meetup because he had a fever.

“Is this the famous Myles I have been hearing about?” she said, and Myles ran and hugged her like he had known her his whole short life.

If a good library is hard to find, a good librarian is even harder to come by—Ms. Carla is a gem. She told me she was going to reserve a room for us for the rest of the year, just for us. And something about that still warms my heart as I write this.

To be honest, I didn’t know who was going to show up. Only three people RSVP’d, and four of my friends who came last time said they weren’t able to make it. I usually leave the RSVPing to my wife, and I thought to myself, this must be what karma feels like.

But to my surprise, dads started rolling in—a couple from the last meetup, and mostly dads I’d never met. One came with a friend he’s known for twenty years. Another came with his daughter and son, who could’ve easily been the babysitters. Another brought coffee (thanks, Dan). Another, my neighbor, came with juice boxes and squeezes. And of course, every dad showed up with a little version of himself.

I smiled because I knew my letters weren’t going back home with me.

The space was filled with the smiles of fathers and their children, and the fatigue I had been feeling just melted away. I felt light. The conversations I overheard and the ones I was a part of reminded me that dads are looking for both care and community.

About forty-five minutes in, I asked the dads to introduce themselves, their kids, and to share a dad win. Some shared about finally getting their kids to use the toilet instead of diapers, while others said simply getting to the meetup on time was a win. I forgot to share mine, but I knew I did’t have too, because I was standing in it.

I thanked the dads for sharing their wins and told them I also knew there are moments that feel like wins but carry the weight of tough losses. Like when your child won’t go to sleep, or throws a tantrum because you won’t let them make snow angels in Target, or when you have to tell them they can’t wear the same underwear they wore yesterday.

I handed each of them a card and told them there was no money or gift card inside, but what it did hold was a note from a dad who wished he had received one of these on a hard day. I told them it was cheesy, barely legible, but it was for someone who knows what it feels like to sometimes feel invisible—someone who is always questioning whether they are a good father.

My favorite moment from the meetup came from a dad who had just wandered into the library with his family—let’s call him D. Carla was telling D about the meetup and when she made eye contact with me, she signaled me to come over. I told D what we were doing, and something about the questions he asked and how he stayed for the meetup let me know I was going to see him again. My last thank you card in my bag went to D, and as I handed it to him and explained what it was for, he smiled.

Saturday was a reminder that showing up in your truth gives others permission to do the same.

If you are a dad reading this, you’re doing a great job. You matter so much so much to world, but especially to the little person who calls you Dad.

Thank you for showing up. And if no one has told you they love you today, I do.

The next meetup is on March 21st and I can’t wait.

See ya’ll soon,

Marc

I’ll be using this part of the newsletter to share some recaps from the monthly meetings. Don’t worry, you’re already subscribed. You’ll continue to get the letters I’ve been writing to Myles, and now you’ll also get an update from the Birmingham Dad Meetup once a month.

If you’re a dad who happens to be in Birmingham, AL, or nearby at all, join the meetup page to stay connected about the monthly gatherings.

As always, thanks for being here.

Read about the last dad meetup here

I write letters to my son, Myles, sharing my journey as a first-time dad and spreading the love I didn't experience myself. If you’ve been here before — thank you for coming back. If you’re new here, here are some good places to start.

• "Wait—Who Taught My Son the 'F' Word?"

• Good dad, decent husband, bad friend

• Am I a Good Dad, or is the Bar Just Really Low?

Dear Myles,

Some mornings are hard; other mornings are harder. You would think it wasn’t the same dance we’ve been doing every day for the past year: going to the bathroom, washing your face, brushing your teeth, eating breakfast, and getting ready for school. But every morning is an adventure within itself. Some mornings are hard; other mornings are harder.

You are about 90 percent potty trained. I’m holding the other 10 percent because any more and I might jinx it. We’ve mastered the tactical wees: the ones before we leave the house, the ones before we leave school, and the ones in between. You’re wearing big boy underwear now, “just like daddies,” you say. And this past week, we got you a new pack. They came in all different colors and all different designs, just like Daddy’s. And the ones you chose to wear were blue with sharks all over them. You loved them. And I’m sure you loved them even more because we let you pick them out yourself. That was yesterday. But the day after, you woke up and wanted to wear them again.

Reasoning with a two-year-old about anything is hard. But trying to explain why it is unsanitary to wear the same underwear two days in a row is like trying to explain taxes to a goldfish. But we try—we negotiate, we legalese, we try to rationalize with you, and you remain unmoved. I look at your mom, and she has that look on her face that says it is time to wrestle the mini-alligator: prepare-for-tantrum mode. But I have an idea, my last one in the tank, and if it works, there won’t be a need for a wrestling match. “Go w-e-t it,” I tell her. I spell it out just to make sure you don’t catch on.

Your mother moves quickly out of your line of sight, behind you to where the hamper is, and fishes out yesterday’s underwear, the ones with blue sharks all over them, balling them in her fist while I make sure your eyes are fixed on me. You are near tears when I hear your mother drenching the underwear under water, while I explain to you that we had to wash it and that it is drying. Yes, my plan was to lie. Just when I hear the faucet turn off, I ask if you want to see it. You tell me yes.

We walk to the bathroom, and there is the underwear hanging on the curtain rod, sopping wet and cold. I point to it, and even though you see it is dripping wet, I hear my plan start to unravel when you say the words, “I want it.” I give it to you anyway because surely the understanding of a two-year-old cannot be this primitive. Surely you wouldn’t want to wear them.

But then you ask me to put them on.

And I look at your mother with a face that says I am all out of plans. Her arms are crossed, and she says, “Let him.” And we do.

I help you put on the blue, soaking wet underwear with sharks on them, and I’m half expecting a tantrum because you’ll want to keep them on. I’m ready to go full 3D Dudley Boyz tag-team mode to get you into dry ones so we can get you to school. When we finally wriggle them up your waist, I make this gross face to try to telepathically communicate with you that soppy, wet pull-ups are not for school. And somehow, it works. You concede. You want them off. I thank God for deliverance. Praise him.

You pick another pair—this one still all blue, but no sharks. “Just like the ocean!” you say. And just when we think we’re home free, you decide today is the day, this day, you want to learn how to put them on yourself. It takes the patience of the saints to watch you, only two years old, whose coordination with hands and feet has not caught up to his mind as of yet. Your mother sits down and explains how to put them on. Each time she tries to help, you want to start over. There’s stubbornness, and then there’s hard-headed. You, my son, could win a headbutt contest against a jawbreaker.

I watch and look at the time and realize this is usually the moment we’re out the door. Teeth aren’t brushed, breakfast hasn’t been eaten, and here we are trying to show you how one foot goes in one hole and one in the other. Eventually, after minutes that feel like hours, you get it. I could’ve praised dace right there, because God, won’t he do it, I think to myself.

You run to the kitchen to eat your breakfast, oatmeal and eggs, which I guess must be cold by now. Your mother and I look at each other with tired eyes, but smiling. I tell her it won’t always be like this. Soon he won’t need us this way. I tell myself I’m grateful that some mornings are hard, but other mornings are harder. And what a blessing and privilege to have jobs where every morning can be an adventure.

At least for now.

Love,

Daddy

If you can’t commit to a monthly subscription, but still want to support Myles’ college plan, here is my Buy Me a Coffee page.

And if you are on Substack, please restack this letter and recommend it so I can share this love with the world.

Let me know your thoughts:

1. Tell me about a time you told a white lie to get a kid to do what you wanted them to do.

2. Tell me about a moment a child showed just how stubborn—and underdeveloped—the prefrontal lobe can be.

3. Have you ever felt both exhausted and completely blessed at the same time?

4. What’s the weirdest thing your kid has ever refused to wear?

Leave a comment

Want more of Myles’ Letters?

• They Say When Man Makes a Plan, God Laughs.

• Myles met his Grandfather in Brooklyn, NY

• Read about Our first Father’s Day.

• A video about beautiful backgrounds: Tell Them Where You're From.

• Read about My Wife’s Love Affair - It’s exactly what you don’t think

• Have you ever been Cooking in the Bathroom kind of tired?

• Check out Carrying the Gift, Holding the Love

This past weekend, I hosted the first official Birmingham Dad Meetup at the Avondale Library. The night before, my son, Myles, became sick, and I considered canceling. I wondered how I could show up to a dad meetup without my son. My wife encouraged me to go anyway, and instead of my son in tow, I showed up with a box of coffee and creamer, hoping it would make up for his absence and for asking a group of dads to meet a stranger at the library the day before the weather was supposed to be horrible.

To my surprise, dads actually showed up. Because it was the library, some were already there, not for the meetup but for their kids. As a few dads who had actually signed up for the event began to roll in, I felt grateful that I had listened to my wife, but sad at the same time Myles couldn’t be there. There’s something about seeing men I have never met gathered early on a Saturday morning, with little versions of themselves trailing behind them or in their arms. It’s hard to believe that just a few months earlier, I had made a post on Reddit, created a meetup group, and hoped for the best. And there it was: five other dads with their beautiful children, searching for what I had been searching for since moving to Birmingham, community.

The teacher in me worried about having a plan. My biggest concern was how to have intimate conversations with men I’ve never met while also making sure no toddler attempted a five-star splash off a library bookshelf. But it happened exactly the way it needed to.

The little ones tore through the library, not a toy left untouched, and the librarians were wonderful. They brought out extra toys for us, the good stuff, the kind they don’t usually leave out - puppets, marble runs, and a Toniebox playing the latest and greatest kid tunes. They even played with some of the little ones that tried to wander off as the dads talked – thank you Ms. Carla and Ms. Mcayla!

While we were only there for an hour and a half, dads shared this space was exactly what they needed. A place for them to hang out with their kids, give their partners a break, and just to be in a place where there are other men in the same season as them.

When a dad asked why I started this, I shared that when my son was born, I was not only in a new place, but I think I was also dealing with depression and was desperate for connection. I told them that most of the content I came across about fatherhood made it feel like being a dad was a standup comedy routine or an act of magic, where fathers were expert magicians who disappeared from the picture. But I knew that wasn’t true. As I dug deeper, I found that dads were present and overjoyed by fatherhood, and at the same time, many felt alone and struggled with how to handle the shift that comes when you bring a child into the picture. I told them I started writing letters to talk through what I was experiencing, and eventually I wanted something more: to meet other dads in real life who were going through the same thing.

And as I shared my story, they started to share too. Stories about feeling guilty for wanting more time for themselves, guilty for feeling like they weren’t good enough, and lost because they did not know that such joy could come with such weight. My favorite moment came from a dad with seven-month-old twins, who shared that this meetup was the first communal thing he had done since moving to Birmingham. As he talked about his journey and how emotionally hard it’s been, I knew this meetup that had been placed on my heart wasn’t just for me, it was for all of us. Even though there were not many of us, the space felt full, and my heart felt light.

I think back to this past Saturday and how much work it must have taken for each of those dads to get up, get their kids ready, load strollers, and drive or walk to a library early on a cold morning. They set aside the nervousness and all the other things that so easily get in the way. Race. Politics. Opinions. All the reasons it can feel easier to stay home.

Saturday was a reminder of how beautiful the world can be when we center and show up for what matters most — our children.

If you are a dad reading this, you’re doing a great job. You matter to so much to the planet, but especially to the little person who calls you dad. Thank you for showing up. And if no one told you they loved you today, I do.

See you at the next Meetup!

Best,

Marc

I’ll be using this part of the newsletter to share some recaps from the monthly meetings. Don’t worry, you’re already subscribed. You’ll continue to get the letters I’ve been writing to Myles, and now you’ll also get an update from the Birmingham Dad Meetup once a month.

If you’re a dad who happens to be in Birmingham, AL, or nearby at all, join the meetup page to stay connected about the monthly gatherings.

If you’re not interested in getting these updates about the Birmingham Dad Meetup, you can unsubscribe using this link here.

As always, thanks for being here.

Subscribe now

If you can’t commit to a monthly subscription, but still want to support Myles’ college plan, here is my Buy Me a Coffee page.

The poem below was inspired by a conversation between Nikki Giovanni and James Baldwin, particularly around the 35-minute mark. Hearing Baldwin speak about his father allowed me to see my own in a different light.

i want to go far 
like my daddy did 
away from here 
to a place where no one knows my name 
to put this bag down that i’ve been carrying 

Read more

Dear Myles,

Last night we had a party

I can’t remember how we used to bring in the new year when I was young, but I do remember how hard my brother and I fought to stay up late to watch the ball drop, just so we could say we did it.

How my mother, your grandmother, took an extra-long shower that night, cleaned the house with such passion, and as soon as the countdown began, she yelled each number as if she might forget them, smiling with her whole beautiful face with her arm wrapped around us.

And when the clock read 0:00 and the new year struck, she hugged us a little harder and prayed a little longer, just like the house she had just cleaned and the shower she had taken. She made sure the piping-hot soup joumou was ready to commemorate our Haitian ancestors.

I can’t remember where my father, your grandfather, was every New Year’s night, but I remember how good he smelled heading out the door. I remember how much he loved to party.

But last night.

The last one before the new year.

We threw a party for you -

and even though there wasn’t soup, the house was cleaned and the clothes were all washed

and even though it was only 8:30, right at your bedtime, we danced hard like it was 11:55,

bubbly in hand, and you with your own, and we started counting down, yelling like your grandma used to

we hugged and prayed and kissed you goodnight, and when the party was over, and the night was quiet

while your mother and I waited for the ball to drop over the next couple hours,

in between the homemade chocolate cookies, the Rotel, and the bubbly we shared,

I wondered, like I sometimes did when I was a kid,

why would anyone want to miss a party with your family.

Happy New Year my son,

To many more New Year parties I can’t wait to be around for -

Love,

Daddy

[Audio of our countdown lol]

If you can’t commit to a monthly subscription, but still want to support Myles’ college plan, here is my Buy Me a Coffee page.

And if you are on Substack, please restack this letter and recommend it so I can share this love with the world.

Let me know your thoughts:

1. How did you usually bring in the New Year when you were growing up?

2. Any traditions you still keep, or new ones you’ve started?

3. How do you feel about resolutions—love them, hate them, or somewhere in between?

4. What’s a New Year’s memory that has stuck with you?

Leave a comment

Want more of Myles’ Letters?

• Myles met his Grandfather in Brooklyn, NY

• Read about Our first Father’s Day.

• A video about beautiful backgrounds: Tell Them Where You're From.

I write letters to my son, Myles, sharing my journey as a first-time dad and spreading the love I didn't experience myself. If you’ve been here before — thank you for coming back. If you’re new here, here are some good places to start.

• "Wait—Who Taught My Son the 'F' Word?"

• Good dad, decent husband, bad friend

• Am I a Good Dad, or is the Bar Just Really Low?

Dear Myles,

After breakfast, when your mother buckles you into your car seat and we pray together for safe travels, she kisses you goodbye.

And before she closes the car door and walks back up the stairs, you never forget to remind her: “kiss daddy, too.”

I remember the first time you said it. It reminds me how, in the spirit of the mornings and in the flow of life, we so easily can forget the love that brought us here.

She walks over and kisses me, and I smile.

In the spirit of the morning, brushing teeth, washing faces, and eating breakfast, we sometimes barely remember to say good morning to each other. But you remind us to slow down and remember the love that brought us here, the love that sits in the car seat, the love that wakes us up early even on weekends, the love that keeps us going, the love we prayed for.

Lately, I’ve been taking the mornings slow and leaning in. Waking a little extra early to make sure breakfast is done so you and I can eat together. You run into the kitchen every morning asking what’s for breakfast like you don’t already know it’s overnight oats and half a fried egg.

I marvel at your skin, the way the morning light ducks under the blinds to touch your face, your smile, your teeth, how you hold your blue fork to bring it to your mouth, steadying the food on it like little men on tightropes, how you shape your lips to say daddy like it’s your favorite word on the planet. I sit in gratitude, watching you eat overnight oats and half a fried egg as if this kitchen deserves a Michelin all on it’s own. “It’s sooooo good, Daddy,” you say. And I think to myself that if God never did anything else, he gave me everything, all in every morning—time with the two people I love the most.

So in the spirit of the morning, after you get tucked in your car seat, and we pray for traveling mercies and she kisses you goodbye, she pauses a little just to hear you yell, “Kiss Daddy, too.” And when she walks over to my side, I smile because I know that there are two people on the planet who will never stop loving me. Thank you for being one of them.

I said it last year and I say it again: it’s hard when your mother asks me what I want for Christmas, because, truly, what do you get a man who truly has everything? Because how can you simply beat two kisses a day?

There is no clever way to say this. Maybe because there is something beautiful in the simple truth, like rocks are hard, water is wet, and you—you are the gift that keeps on giving.

Thank you for reminding us of the love that brought us here.

Love,

Daddy

If you can’t commit to a monthly subscription, but still want to support Myles’ college plan, here is my Buy Me a Coffee page.

And if you are on Substack, please restack this letter and recommend it so I can share this love with the world.

Let me know your thoughts:

1. What little moment recently made you stop and smile?

2. Any small holiday traditions that make mornings feel extra special?

3. What’s one tiny thing you’re grateful for this week?

4. Have you had a moment lately that reminded you life is pretty good?

5. What simple joys are you holding onto this holiday season?

Leave a comment

Want more of Myles’ Letters?

• They Say When Man Makes a Plan, God Laughs.

• Myles met his Grandfather in Brooklyn, NY

• Read about Our first Father’s Day.

• A video about beautiful backgrounds: Tell Them Where You're From.

• Read about My Wife’s Love Affair - It’s exactly what you don’t think

• Have you ever been Cooking in the Bathroom kind of tired?

• Check out Carrying the Gift, Holding the Love

If you have been following this newsletter for a while, you know my story.

Since my son, Myles, was born, I have been writing him letters to process the love I didn’t necessarily experience myself.

You know the story about meeting his mother on the subway platform in Brooklyn, NY.

You know that after two years of trying to conceive, we moved to Ethiopia, we did our part, and God did His, and in time my wife finally got pregnant.

You know how something changed in me when he was born, and that Raising Myles has been healing for my own inner child.

You know how much I think about even if he’s just two what it means to be raising a little Black boy in this world that may never love him back.

You know how love can make you move mountains, so we moved to Birmingham, AL, where his mother is from, and how hard it was and is to make it feel like home, because home isn’t just a place; it’s the people who make you feel at home.

This past month, I’ve been thinking about how to make a place feel like home, not just for me, but for other dads who are looking for a place to gather, love, talk, and celebrate the joy and hardships of being fathers, a place where dads can feel held, understood, and at home together.

In the new year, I am putting together a monthly gathering called The Birmingham Dad Meetup. It is exactly what it sounds like.

Fatherhood can be beautiful, but it can also be lonely. I am committed to making fatherhood a space grounded in care, community, and commitment.

I’ll be using this part of the newsletter to share some recaps from the monthly meetings. Don’t worry, you’re already subscribed. You’ll continue to get the letters I’ve been writing to Myles, and now you’ll also get an update from the Birmingham Dad Meetup once a month.

If you’re a dad who happens to be in Birmingham, AL, or nearby at all, join the meetup page to stay connected about the monthly gatherings.

If you’re not interested in getting these updates about the Birmingham Dad Meetup, you can unsubscribe using this link here.

As always, thanks for being here.

Love,

Marc Typo

This past Saturday, I got a group of dads together who I admire for our first meetup. It was beautiful.

I write letters to my son, Myles, sharing my journey as a first-time dad and spreading the love I didn't experience myself. If you’ve been here before — thank you for coming back. If you’re new here, here are some good places to start.

• "Wait—Who Taught My Son the 'F' Word?"

• Good dad, decent husband, bad friend

• Am I a Good Dad, or is the Bar Just Really Low?

Dear Myles,

Every morning when I drop you off at your classroom, I love how all your friends greet you. They scream your name like they’ve been waiting for you all morning, like they didn’t just see you the day before. I linger a little at your classroom door, after I’ve just hugged you goodbye, just to see some of them run up to you and even hug you. They parade around you like you just hit a home run and the bases were loaded. I don’t know how deep friendships and love between two-year-olds can be, but something tells me they see you for who you are. There’s beauty and love in watching the communion of smiles and laughter between you and these other kids you met just months ago that I wish for myself.

Because it’s hard making friends in your thirties. Harder when you left a place where you had deep roots, and harder when you have to start from scratch. Because at this age, it feels like people have their people. That if friendships were a plant, at this point the roots aren’t only deep; it feels like there simply isn’t space for new seeds — the soil is set and packed tight.

And it’s not that I don’t know how to meet new people — but meeting new people takes time. Time I don’t feel like I always have. Because going out to meet new people means that instead of playing zone defense at home with your mother, it turns into man-to-man. And if you know ball, everyone knows that playing zone is a lot easier than man-to-man (unless you’re playing against Steph Curry, then defense really doesn’t matter).

I miss the ease of being around people who know me, and I know the people. And while I’m surrounded by people who I know love me, I think for the first time I really feel and understand the adage, “there’s no place like home.” Because here I live in a home I never dreamed of having: space for you to run around, two living rooms, a two-car garage, and even a guest room. We have a front yard and a backyard, we have a deck, and a dining room that we sit in less than five times a year, but sometimes I wonder what it would be like to go back to NY. I wonder how the first apartment your mother and I had together, an apartment not even half the size of two rooms in our house, could feel so full. And then I realize, it’s not where we laid our heads but the people who once held us.

I don’t miss the New York winter, the backbreaking shoveling we had to do to get our car out of the snow, only for someone to take the spot after we left. I don’t miss circling the block praying for a parking spot, and the glimmer of hope when you think you finally found one only for it to be a fire hydrant looking at you like “got emmmm.” I don’t miss the rent that priced us out or the smell of a subway car that told you not to step on. I don’t miss how it took an hour’s drive to go from Bed-Stuy to the Upper East Side, which is only four miles. But I miss the people — my people.

I miss how close my people felt even if they were in another borough. How we could link over dinner or a bike ride, or a bike ride to dinner. How you could catch a vibe with a friend, and as long as you had fare for the train, you were alright. I miss the let-out after a good day party, how we electric-slid out the door to meet the sun waiting for us, only for us to ask, yo, what’s next? I miss how even when I felt alone, I could hop on my fixie and ride in the street heading west until I hit the water under the Brooklyn Bridge. Something about being surrounded by other bikers and people delivering food on scooters and electric bikes, all of us zipping through gridlocked traffic, could make anyone feel less alone.

I miss the feeling of seeing friends — my friends. Especially when I haven’t seen them in a while. It’s just like when I drop you off at school; they act like they’ve been waiting for weeks, even though it’s been years. My friends loved me for who I was because they know who I am.

I’m learning, and feeling even more lately, that home isn’t just a place: it’s the people who make you feel like home.

I’m wondering how long it takes for a place to feel like home.

And maybe if I can’t get to home, maybe I can create it.

I love you, and there’s nothing you can do about it.

Love Daddy,

If you are a dad in or near Birmingham, AL and have room for friends.

Hit me up – I’m looking for friends, I’m looking for community.

Also sending love to these guys right here. I’ve never met them in real life, but the way we have connected over writing has been a balm. I can’t wait to meet you all one day and laugh till we cry. Love ya’ll

If you can’t commit to a monthly subscription, but still want to support Myles’ college plan, here is my Buy Me a Coffee page.

And if you are on Substack, please restack this letter and recommend it so I can share this love with the world.

Thanks for being here.

Leave a comment

Want more of Myles’ Letters?

• They Say When Man Makes a Plan, God Laughs.

• Myles met his Grandfather in Brooklyn, NY

• Read about Our first Father’s Day.

• A video about beautiful backgrounds: Tell Them Where You're From.

• Read about My Wife’s Love Affair - It’s exactly what you don’t think

• Have you ever been Cooking in the Bathroom kind of tired?

• Check out Carrying the Gift, Holding the Love

I write letters to my son, Myles, sharing my journey as a first-time dad and spreading the love I didn't experience myself. If you’ve been here before — thank you for coming back. If you’re new here, here are some good places to start.

• "Wait—Who Taught My Son the 'F' Word?"

• Good dad, decent husband, bad friend

• Am I a Good Dad, or is the Bar Just Really Low?

2 Years Old

Dear Myles,

I grew up the kind of poor where you didn’t know you were poor—the kind where we didn’t have much but always looked good. The kind where you couldn’t tell because our shoes were always clean and our faces shone so bright with Vaseline that when the light hit, it made the sun wince. The kind of poor where a sock or pair of underwear never had a hole in it because your grandmother always warned us that if we ever got hit by a car, our drawers had to be clean.

See, I never knew we were poor because we were always fed—well fed. For God’s sake, I wore husky, and my thighs were so thick in elementary that my pants flooded. There weren’t gifts under the Christmas tree, but every holiday felt like Thanksgiving. Your grandmother struggled to make the rent, but food was plenty. Pots on the stove took up two burners, and the chicken was so good you ate it down to the gristle.

I don’t know how she did it, but your grandmother worked all day, picked us up from after-school, and could make diri kole, bunun pezi, sauce pwa, and vyan poul—and made Tuesday feel like Sunday dinner. A prayer, a full plate, and the kind of itis that made you sink into the couch made us feel rich.

For the life of me, I still cannot figure out how she fed two boys who could eat a house out of a home. Because you are only two, and sometimes I wonder how something so small can eat so much. How did a dozen eggs last us a week when we were young, but only a couple of days for you, me, and your mother?

What kind of praying did your grandmother do on an income that was less than half of mine, yet managed to cook enough for us at night and for my friends who over for breakfast before school: pancakes, eggs, and bacon in rotation. How did your grandmother have so much less, but the fridge was always full? Because the math ain’t mathing.

And then I remember the food stamp card she used to pay for groceries.

How at the beginning of the month, we had enough groceries to fill the shopping cart to the brim. And when that money hit on the first, I just knew I could get a couple of snacks and my favorite cereal. How the first of the month meant she was able to give a little more to her friends, and they could give a little too. See, when your fridge is full and the stomachs of your children are too you always have bread to share.

I’m grateful for the meals your grandmother made, the God that supplied, and the SNAP card that put a little extra on our plate when we needed it. Because if yesterday were today, and the government was just about to starve 42 million people tomorrow, I’m not sure what would have happened.

We live in a world where famine and hunger are man-made, where people profit from hunger. Where more hungry people means fatter wallets. Where I can write about these things from a distance now without worrying, because grace means I no longer need help from the government—but I used to. What would happen if yesterday were today, and we didn’t have the means to put food on the table, and the little money we were getting to fill our plates was about to disappear? Who would I be if I were hungry and not fed?

Because those food stamps used to slap, but I can’t stop thinking about what would have happened if we didn’t get them when we were younger. I can’t imagine me, a father now, and you, hungry—crying for food with your mouth and signing for more with your hands.

I want you to remember that what we have now is not because we deserve it and others don’t. Part of it is grace, but a large part of it is man’s insatiable desire for greed. In a world where everyone matters, no one should go hungry.

I hope, when you are old enough, you learn how much having is a gift. I hope one day you learn to share—to split a dollar in two and cut a coin in four. Because truthfully, it feels like a time is coming when all you’ll have are the people who hold you up when life is hard because the system would rather build ballrooms on the bellies of hungry children than see them fed.

But remember, billionaires are edible.

I love you, and there’s nothing you can do about it.

Love,

Daddy

If you can’t commit to a monthly subscription, but still want to support Myles’ college plan, here is my Buy Me a Coffee page.

And if you are on Substack, please restack this letter and recommend it so I can share this love with the world.

This letter is inspired by:

1. ’s - Starving You is the Point: The Neuroscience of Hunger and Obedience in America

2. ’s - Millions are about to go hungry. We need to build power with them.

3. My childhood.

4. My 93-year-old grandma, Myles’s great-grandma, is among the many people I love who will lose their SNAP benefits on November 1.

   Leave a comment

Want more of Myles’ Letters?

• They Say When Man Makes a Plan, God Laughs.

• Myles met his Grandfather in Brooklyn, NY

• Read about Our first Father’s Day.

• A video about beautiful backgrounds: Tell Them Where You're From.

• Read about My Wife’s Love Affair - It’s exactly what you don’t think

• Have you ever been Cooking in the Bathroom kind of tired?

• Check out Carrying the Gift, Holding the Love

I write letters to my son, Myles, sharing my journey as a first-time dad and spreading the love I didn’t experience myself. If you’ve been here before — thank you for coming back. If you’re new here, here are some good places to start.

• Your First Words

• For the Love of Water

• Unusual Humor

If you’ve been here before — thank you for coming back.

Dear Myles,

I am not sure how it’s possible, but somehow, my phone with 256 gigs of space has run out of room. When I finally opened my settings to see what could have filled it up so quickly, it all made sense.

I got this phone a little before you were born, a little more than two years ago. When I scroll through my photo log, nearly every other picture is of you. You can trace your whole story through these images—from the first time you began to form in your mother’s belly, the way she smiled and held that small bump that would soon be you, still reminds me how much we prayed for that moment. To your first sonogram, when I asked forgiveness instead of permission and snapped a photo during the appointment even though I wasn’t supposed to anyway. And then the day we left the hospital, when your preemie outfit swallowed you whole, and we had to roll up the sleeves just so we could see your tiny fingers.

You can see the time we gave you a lemon —how you scrunched up your face as if you would never trust us to feed you again—and even though you can’t see us in the frame, you can hear us laughing, so, so hard. There are photos and videos of your first steps, how my voice cracked because I never thought seeing you do something for the first time could be so beautiful.

As I scrolled through them, trying to decide which ones to delete to make more space, I froze. What could possibly go? The one where your mother pulled up after being gone all day, and you ran to her as if she had been gone for a month?

Or should I delete our first horseback ride together at last year’s community fall fest, when I could feel your little body tense up from being so high above the ground signaling to me I better not let you fall.

How do I decide between keeping the video of you meeting your grandfather for the first time, how he grabbed you with such possession it made me wonder if he had held me like that when I was your age, or the one where you are sitting on Grandma’s lap eating soup joumou? Only a picture could capture the way your eyes widened when the amalgamation of flavors of all things wonderful hit your tongue. I smile every time I see it, because that trip to Jersey from Alabama was so hard, but seeing your little yellow soup mustache made it all worth it.

Every time I press record now, my phone reminds me there is no space, that something has to go. And that makes me a little sad, because everything feels so precious. If I scroll fast enough, I can see your two front teeth turn into a full smile of molars, or how your skin went from “is this jaundice?” to “that boy chocolate like yo momma.” Pictures that remind me how you used to fit across my chest, and now you are too heavy for me to carry more than a block.

Why must phones run out of space? Is this why growing up there were so many album books? How parents try to capture life in stills so we can look back and see what used to be and what’s no longer?

I’ve been thinking about these letters lately, about how one day you will be able to read them for yourself. It makes me feel full, because I’ll never run out of space. You’ll never have to sift through 256 gigs of data, wondering what’s special and what’s not, or what story hides behind a picture—like one in an old album no one thought to write on the back of. These letters feel like my way of writing in a photo album you will one day open, where every photo and video has its story, your story — our stories.

This week I ignored the message on my phone telling me something has to go. I took out my old camera, and while I reflected on all those pictures of you, I realized we don’t have enough of us—just us together. Because who takes pictures of the photographer anyway?

I can’t prove it, but I think the first selfie came from a dad who, while taking a picture of his family, finally decided to turn his wrist ever so slightly, placed himself between the lens and his family, and stretch his arm as far as he could—as if to say, let me get in on this because I matter too.

And this is why I love this video of us reading. Because we’re together. Because there is something about you that makes my voice raise an octave. Because there is something about love that makes a man’s voice sound like he should sing soprano.

And when I am tired and exhausted, it’s these video, these moments, that have my phone’s data bursting at the seams, reminding me that all of this will one day be the past.

These videos and these letters, I hope when you read them, you will know that I loved you, and there is nothing you can do about it.

Love,

Daddy

These letters are a labor of love. All funds collected from writing these letters go toward Myles' college savings. A paid subscription also gives you access to these letters where I explore fatherhood more deeply, discuss my own upbringing, and reflect on what it means to be raising a Black son.

Subscribe now

If you can’t commit to a monthly subscription, but still want to support, here is my Buy Me a Coffee page.

And if you are on Substack, please restack this letter and recommend it so I can share this love with the world.

Let me know your thoughts:

1. Have you ever hesitated to delete a photo not because of what it showed, but because of what it made you feel?

2. What do you hope your child will understand about you through the photos, letters, or moments you leave behind?

3. How has becoming a parent changed what you notice, what you save, or what you let go of?

4. How do we decide what is worth keeping when everything feels precious? Admittedly, this chapter we are living in, I wish I can press delete!

Leave a comment

Want more of Myles’ Letters?

• How I Met Your Mother was was featured on Substack Reads!

• Have you ever been Cooking in the Bathroom kind of tired?

• Check out Carrying the Gift, Holding the Love

• Read about Our first Father’s Day.

I write letters to my son, Myles, sharing my journey as a first-time dad and spreading the love I didn't experience myself. If you’ve been here before — thank you for coming back. If you’re new here, here are some good places to start.

• "Wait—Who Taught My Son the 'F' Word?"

• Good dad, decent husband, bad friend

• Am I a Good Dad, or is the Bar Just Really Low?

  A Gentle Heads Up: This week, I added a few pictures of us. I want Myles to see not only how happy we are now, but also the joy we shared back then.

2 Years Old

Dear Myles,

I thought that when I became a dad, I would no longer dream.

I romanticized being a father, your father, so much that I believed this would be it. I told myself that after finally conceiving the child we prayed for, after two years of waiting, this had to be the dream. What more could there be after meeting your mother and then having you?

But I was wrong. The dreams did not end there. In fact, the ones I put off—the ones I procrastinated, the ones buried like seeds I never watered—began to sprout. They made me feel like a child again. I began to ask what was possible, what is possible, who I was, and who I could still be.

I love being a father, your father, but I find myself missing the time I used to have for myself—the kind that did not involve planning everything around a child. I do not dream of labor. I miss getting off work and doing nothing. I miss watching TV with your mother until the sun came up. I miss how we used to stay out late, being slightly irresponsible, knowing we had work the next day. I miss how easily our bodies folded into one another, when the only thing we loved more than each other was the God who brought us together.

You know what I miss the most? Sleeping past 7 a.m. on the weekend. A friend visited recently and brought us all dinner, and when I asked him what time he wakes up on weekends, he said without hesitation, “When I want.” Truthfully, in that moment I wanted to ask him to leave, but that would have been no way to treat a guest who had just treated us all to dinner.

I miss time. I miss having it and doing what I wanted with it. Because once you get dropped off at school, it feels like the hour hand turns into Noah Lyles and the minute hand into Sha’Carri, racing to 4 p.m.—but then, somehow, it all slows down the moment we pick you up. I miss time for my dreams. And while you are everything we prayed for, I admit I have to remind myself to be present.

My heart knows that this time, the time of now, will be short and fleeting. I hear stories of people who wish their children would come see them more, who tell me that these years will pass, but my mind cannot fathom it right now. The sleep deprivation. The constant explanations of why you cannot eat chicken nuggets for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, and the tantrums, oh the tantrums, make it hard not to look past today.

And I know your mother misses her dreams too. I miss watching her dream and strive for hers. And when I asked her about her dreams, she reminded me that this, the life we have now, the one where we used to pray for a child, you, used to be a dream too. I needed that reminder, it called me right back to those moments we used to cry for what we have now.

This week she sent me this poem I cannot stop thinking about. I’m sharing it here with you, because maybe it’ll find you one day the way it has found me.

It’s not my turn. by Kelcey 

It’s not my turn to go where I want, when I want.

It’s not my turn to put my wants and needs first.

It’s not my turn to get butterflies on a first date.

It’s not my turn to plan a wedding.

I’ve had my turn.

It’s not my turn to leisurely enjoy my coffee with slow mornings.

It’s not my turn to explore all of my interests and hobbies.

It’s not my turn to spend my days as I please.

It’s not my turn to spoil grandchildren.

Hopefully, I’ll have my turn.

It’s not my turn to take a Mediterranean vacation.

It’s not my turn to maintain a luscious backyard oasis.

It’s not my turn to have abs.

It’s not my turn to binge-watch Netflix when I’ve had a hard week.

Maybe one day I’ll have a turn…or, maybe not.

But, it is my turn…

It’s my turn to have some sleepless nights.

It’s my turn for late-night snacks, so I don’t have to share.

It’s my turn to have my clothes stretched out by little hands.

It’s my turn to have fingerprints on the screen door.

It’s my turn to have Cocomelon stuck in my head.

It’s my turn to do laundry. So. Much. Laundry.

It’s my turn to keep romance alive amidst the routine.

But even more than that,

It’s my turn to start family traditions.

It’s my turn to memorize the perfect squishiness of chubby baby faces.

It’s my turn to let a popsicle make anything better.

It’s my turn to heal boo-boo’s with a kiss.

It’s my turn to cuddle and rock.

It’s my turn for park days and play dates.

It’s my turn for first steps, first words, and first days of school.

It’s my turn to earn my laugh lines and gray hairs.

It’s my turn to soak up the beautiful, exhausting, magic of motherhood while the turn is still mine.

I’m not sure I’m ready to accept that it’s not my turn anymore. Maybe this makes me selfish. Maybe I still have some growing to do. I’ve never claimed to have it all figured out. Admittedly, I’ve been a little angry lately and a little less patient, because things aren’t getting easier—they’re getting harder. But I’m realizing some of that anger should be directed at myself. I think I’m grieving the time I used to have and realizing that when it was my turn, I didn’t always use it as wisely as I do now. When you have so little of it, you treat it so much more preciously

But something about you coming along makes me want to be better. I wonder if it’s possible that this turn gets to be ours. Maybe I’m still dreaming, and maybe I need to wake up.

I love you, and there’s nothing you can do about it.

Love,

Daddy

* I just love this little scoot you did at the end. [January 2025]

Shoutout time: A special thank-you to my high school English teacher for signing up as a paid subscriber. Thank you for pouring so much into me—you taught me not only how to write, but also how to pour into others.

If you can’t commit to a monthly subscription, but still want to support Myles’ college plan, here is my Buy Me a Coffee page.

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Let me know your thoughts:

1. When you became a parent, did you feel like your dreams had to pause, or did new ones start to take shape?

2. Do you remember a period of your life you miss — the freedom, the late nights, the “just for me” time? How do you honor that now?

3. How has seeing your child grow changed the way you view your own dreams and ambitions?

4. What’s the best-intentioned advice you’ve ever received as a parent that was… super annoying?

   Leave a comment

Want more of Myles’ Letters?

These are Subscriber’s favorites:

• They Say When Man Makes a Plan, God Laughs.

• Myles met his Grandfather in Brooklyn, NY

• Read about Our first Father’s Day.

• A video about beautiful backgrounds: Tell Them Where You're From.

• Read about My Wife’s Love Affair - It’s exactly what you don’t think

• Have you ever been Cooking in the Bathroom kind of tired?

• Check out Carrying the Gift, Holding the Love

I write letters to my son, Myles, sharing my journey as a first-time dad and spreading the love I didn't experience myself. If you’ve been here before — thank you for coming back. If you’re new here, here are some good places to start.

• "Wait—Who Taught My Son the 'F' Word?"

• Good dad, decent husband, bad friend

• Am I a Good Dad, or is the Bar Just Really Low?

2 Years Old

Dear Myles,

I did something for myself today.

The past two weeks have been hard. You were sick, and whatever you had, you graciously passed it on to your mother. Parenting is hard, but being a sick parent is even harder. The show does not stop—it must go on. People need to be fed, jobs must be worked, and pull-ups need to be changed. In these past two weeks, I’ve often thought about how hard it must be for single parents, especially single mothers like my mother, your grandmother. How was she able to raise me and my brother alone?

While you finally got better, your mother took a turn for the worse, wheezing, in pain, and sneezing—everything at once. And you are at the age where you could care less. Balls need to be caught, your attention needs to be attended to, and your mother’s love, sick or not, is demanded. I handled the pickups and drop-offs, and to give her extra rest every day after school, we went to the library, the park, or soccer practice.

But Tuesday, my meeting ended early. I had about 45 minutes to spare, and instead of picking you up early, I took the local way home. It’s the route where I could ride with both windows down and play the music I usually can’t with a toddler in the back. I drove the way I would never drive because the highway is faster. When you have a child, time always feels more precious because there is always so little time for anything else.

But it just so happens, as I am driving with the windows down and the music playing, and the toddler seat is empty, that I pass the ice cream shop we usually go to together as a family. I immediately tell myself, “I don’t need ice cream right now.” Too often, it’s too easy to convince myself that because I don’t need it, I should not have it. But this time, I tell myself I want it.

I make a U-turn, park, and walk in. I walk into that ice cream shop for the first time, maybe ever, without your mother and without you clamoring at the seams of my pants. It’s still work hours, so the shop is empty—no kids in sight. It feels the same way it does after we put you down for the night. I feel my body just sink into itself, the permission to relax I call it.

We are regulars here, and I do not recognize the scooper—she must be new, I figured. I walk up and order my seasonal favorite, peach-apple cardamom. To this day, even if you showed me a picture of cardamom, I could not tell you anything about it, but the person who decided to pair it with peaches and put it in ice cream deserves the Nobel Peace Prize.

When the scooper asks cone or cup, I think for a moment and gladly say cone, because today, today we do not have to share. When she emerges from down below with my scoops, I cannot believe this is a split scoop. She is not only new, she is beautifully heavy-handed, and I… I am in love.

I sit outside where we usually sit as a family, at a table with four chairs, one for each of us, and the bag we always carry your essentials: snacks, pull-ups, water, and wipes. But today, it’s just me. I take up space, put my feet up, and savor every bit of the peachy, milky goodness, and whatever this cardamom thing is. Ice cream tastes a lot better when you do not have to share with a toddler whose spoon is digging at your cup and who won’t stop saying “more” after you just gave him more. At what age do toddlers learn the word savor? That day, I realized I remembered it myself.

I sit back and let the flavors do their work in my mouth. I eat the ice cream slowly, as if I have nowhere to go because truthfully, for those 45 minutes, it felt like a vacation.

And while the ice cream does its work, I ask myself: why don't I do this more often? Why don't I take more time for myself? After working full time, studying, being a husband, and being a father, it often feels like only the dregs are left. Sometimes it feels like asking for more time for me means more work for your mother. And truthfully, I know she feels the same.

I watch us—fully present, fully tired—how neither of us want to miss a moment, but also don't want the other to feel too burdened. And it's not at all that you are a burden, but there is this thing called fatigue that, as a two-year-old, you are not yet aware of, that has its way with us.

Some people often ask, “Well, what about the grandparents, and this person, and that person?” They don't know how much privilege it is to have grandparents who are here, alive, and present. We have none of those sorts. And while there are people here who I know love us, there is nothing like having your own mother and father—here, alive, and present. Most times we don’t want advice, we want the impossible, the what’s no longer here, the people who birthed us who are not here to be with us, to hold us, to support us, to allow us to take ice cream dates without a clamoring child tugging at our cones and digging his wooden spoon into our artisan ice cream flavors. I am meandering now.

I know fully we can’t pour from empty cups, but cups get empty and the show does not stop—it must go on. People need to be fed, jobs must be worked, and pull-ups need to be changed. But that day, that Tuesday felt different. Maybe taking time for me looks like taking the long way to your daycare after work, leaving early and getting ice cream flavors I can barely pronounce. Maybe taking up space for myself doesn’t need to mean I’m being selfish.

I spend so much time trying to prove to everyone—you, your mother, the planet, myself—that as long as everyone else is good, I’m good. Like this ice cream, I told myself I didn’t need it, that I don’t need any time just for me. But I realize that’s not true. We both need time: time for ourselves, time for each other, and time without you.

After I finished, I hopped in the car and continued driving the local way to your daycare with the windows down. I felt a sense of joy and ease, and I looked forward to seeing your smile when I picked you up. And when I walk in and finally see your face, I’m reminded why I need to take care of myself, eat ice cream alone, and play the music I want. The more I take care of myself and love myself, the more capacity I have to love those around me—not in fatigue, but in the love that you deserve.

I hope you know, I love you and there is nothing you can do about it.

Love,

Daddy

If you can’t commit to a monthly subscription, but still want to support Myles’ college plan, here is my Buy Me a Coffee page.

And if you are on Substack, please restack this letter and recommend it so I can share this love with the world.

Let me know your thoughts:

1. When was the last time you did something just for yourself?

2. Do you ever feel guilty about taking time for yourself? Why or why not?

3. What’s your “ice cream moment”—a small joy you savor without sharing?

4. How’s your heart?

Leave a comment

Want more of Myles’ Letters?

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• They Say When Man Makes a Plan, God Laughs.

• Myles met his Grandfather in Brooklyn, NY

• Read about Our first Father’s Day.

• A video about beautiful backgrounds: Tell Them Where You're From.

• Read about My Wife’s Love Affair - It’s exactly what you don’t think

• Have you ever been Cooking in the Bathroom kind of tired?

• Check out Carrying the Gift, Holding the Love

Myles and I attended our first-ever family reunion this past weekend. It was filled with food, family, Boots on the Ground, and The O’Jays on repeat. I seen a kid who couldn’t have been in middle school yet playing Spades, and enough fried fish that would’ve gave Jesus a run for his money. I come from a small family, but when I met my wife, that family grew—two aunty teams, three dozen cousins, and lots and lots of chirren. What I love most is all of them, all 200 of them, call me Uncle Marc. As much as I miss my family back home, these people are my family, and we stick closer than some cold grits.

This past weekend made me think about a poem and video I recorded for Myles that I shared with you all when he was still in diapers, just about six months old. I use to record these more often before Myles got his feet under him. You can watch them here.

This poem i’m resharing feels even more special after the reunion. It reminds me that—along with these letters, like the photos shared this past weekend of loved ones who are no longer here—it will outlive us. The words I wrote to him will one day be shared with the person he chooses to love and perhaps the children he may raise. I find comfort in knowing I am not only writing for him, but also for the family I may never meet.

There is a beauty in knowing that when they look for me on any family tree, there will be letters, videos, and notes showing how I lived and loved. I am reminded that these letters are not just about Myles, but about the legacy we will leave behind.

When I first shared this poem with you, there were only about 800 of you here. Now, there are over 4,000. If you are hearing or seeing it for the first time, I hope it brings you warmth and inspires you to write your own. Until Myles can read these for himself, your support, love, and encouragement keep me going.

Love,

Marc Typo

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Dear Myles,
This is for when they ask, "Where are you from?"

Tell them you were born in Birmingham, Alabama, in the presence of black aunties who welcomed you into the world while your father cried with gratitude. 

Tell them you were conceived in Ethiopia, in a small town called Debre, Birhan. Your father a teacher, your mother a leader, and God the visionary.

Tell them you’re from catfish and grits, and Soup Joumou on the first day of the year. One for good luck, the other for liberation - double the blessing. 

From I ain't studdin you to pa jwe avèm, two tongues masterfully woven in a language only you can understand.

From bel ti gason and that boy clean, and so many aunties that could form an auntie  football team.

Tell them you’re from Crown Heights and Ensley, your mama and daddy, rare breeds when you pollinate roses and concrete. 

Tell them without a stutter in your tongue, you're from a pocket full of Poseys, all about the Princes, and "Yo Pierre, you wanna come outside?"

From parents who prayed, grandmother's testimonies, and aunties who said, “Don't worry y'all, it'll happen.” 

Tell them the world was waiting for you to arrive,

You're the blessing the ancestors dreamed for,

You are God’s gift to the planet.

Love, 
Daddy

If you can’t commit to a monthly subscription, but still want to support Myles’ college plan, here is my Buy Me a Coffee page.

And if you are on Substack, please restack this letter and recommend it so I can share this love with the world.

Let me know your thoughts:

1. Did you watch the video? What are your raw thoughts?

2. Where are you from, and what unique cultural nuggets make your roots special?

3. Ever had to navigate between two tongues like "I ain't studdin ya" to "pa jwe avèm"? What’s it like for you?

4. Parents: My wife and I come from two beautiful yet different backgrounds. How do you balance giving a child both?

5. What's one piece of advice, prayer, or testimony from your family that has stayed with you?

6. This poem was a take on George Ella Lyons' "Where I’m From" Poem. Feel free to drop a stanza or two if you like!

   Leave a comment

Want more of Myles’ Letters?

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• How I Met Your Mother was was featured on Substack Reads!

• Read about My Wife’s Love Affair - It’s exactly what you don’t think

• Have you ever been Cooking in the Bathroom kind of tired?

• Check out Carrying the Gift, Holding the Love

• Read about Our first Father’s Day.

I write letters to my newborn son, Myles, sharing my journey as a first-time dad and spreading the love I didn't experience myself. If you’ve been here before — thank you for coming back. If you’re new here, here are some good places to start.

• They Say When Man Makes a Plan, God Laughs

• I Never Knew Grief Could Be a Place

Dear Myles,

I don’t know if I am a good dad or if the bar is just really low. If this were baseball, where the three pitches were named Dad, Husband, and Friend, I would probably at least bunt at the Dad pitch.

The jury is still out on whether I am a good husband. When you have a son, you can be amazing parents and great roommates, but the husband-and-wife part sometimes takes a back seat. Do you know what’s driving at 90 mph the wrong way down a one-way street every single day of your life when you are a parent? Fatigue.

But I am striking out hard on the Friend pitch. (Clearly, we have been watching a lot of baseball lately).

Something changes when you have a child. All of a sudden you’re late to everything, you can’t remember anything, and you do things that don’t make sense. At least twice a week your mother walks into the room and says something like, “Why is this [random item] in this [random place where it has no business being]?” Like a game of Mad Libs, my last one was yogurt in the spice cabinet. But I can live with that. It’s not like I forgot the fork in the microwave. Although once, when your mother made broccoli, I couldn’t remember if I had eaten it or packed it. Lo and behold, a week later, moldy broccoli spawned from the cabinet. I don’t know if this started when you were born, or if my inability to remember anything and everything was always there, and having you in the picture just makes everything feel like I’m cooking in the bathroom.

Here’s what else has changed—my friendships. I used to be the strong friend, the one you could call when you just needed to talk and shoot the poop. The one you could bet a million dollars on to answer the phone. But now—please don’t call me. Even if you did, you wouldn’t get any richer, because I have a son, and somewhere along the way, I became the bad friend.

Someone should’ve sent the memo that when you become a parent, everything changes. You can’t just call friends to talk anymore; you have to schedule a freaking phone call. One of my friends and I have a monthly Thursday call on our calendars. It went well for the first four months, but now it’s just taking up a spot. Back in the day, those were the feral times, the wild ones, when we could just call each other and talk. It was easy, and normal, we just talked on the phone while doing nothing. But now, parenting is like running a business. If it’s not life or death—even if there’s a chance we could all be millionaires—it still needs to be scheduled.

Or there were days when I didn’t really need an app to tell me my friends’ birthdays. Fun fact: I’ve stopped using social media for months now so I can be more present with you—and I forgot my best friend’s birthday. Check out this text she sent:

It was a week after her birthday, and she had to remind me that I forgot. I made an excuse—with typos, of course—and finally apologized. I love my friend so much. She loves that I’m a father, but she doesn’t allow me to use fatherhood as an excuse for being a bad friend. I know missing birthdays doesn’t make me a bad friend, but this was the second year in a row. And missing two best friend birthdays in a row doesn’t make me a bad friend, but friendship and love need to be reciprocated. You can’t just keep taking from people without investing back. Like, what if friendship was a savings account? Worse than an overdraft fee, you eventually just lost someone you cared about because you never made a deposit, never checked the balance, never showed up when it mattered. The truth is, maybe a kid makes you do things like store yogurt in the spice cabinet, but maybe I’m just a bad friend.

I’ve been meaning to schedule a call with another dad for weeks now—just so we can talk. But sometimes your mother and I are so tired that after we put you to bed, we barely want to talk to each other. We just want to relish in the silence of central air, crickets, and not having to worry about the thousand ways you could hurt yourself in the last two hours we have before sleep. Honestly, after a long day, we all sometimes just need space—and some of us clearly just need more hours in a day just so we can shower.

It’s been about three weeks now, and I still haven’t called him back, but I hope he got a chance to take a shower.

Your mother tells me that friendship and true intimacy are birthed in the inconvenience—when you’re too tired or don’t feel like doing something, but you show up anyway. I want to ask her if she and I are parenting the same kid, but she’s right. Being tired and having a kid is no excuse for not showing up for people. It’s not some free “get out of jail” card called the toddler excuse. Trust and believe, I played that card way too often, and each time, I realized skipping out cost me more than just a few hours; it cost me connection.

Recently, I missed your God mother’s anniversary even though it was on my calendar. By the time I realized, I felt so guilty, because I’m tired of apologizing for being a bad friend. I just avoided it altogether. There’s more proof I’m a bad friend. Maybe I’m just a bad person.

Years ago, I read a tweet from my good friend , who I’ve known since high school, that keeps coming back to me now. It went something like: “Some people say they want community, but in truth, they just want a kingdom. They want everyone to invest in them, but they themselves don’t want to invest in people or other relationships—they want relationships to center around them.”

And I know that wasn’t a subtweet, but damn—it sure felt like a submarine in my side. I don’t want a kingdom; I want community. I want to be better to my community. I don’t want to be just a good dad, a decent husband, and a bad friend. I’m tired of apologizing to the people I love saying over and over again, “I’m sorry I didn’t call back, I’m sorry I missed your anniversary, I’m sorry I missed your birthday.” I’m tired of them giving me grace, loving me, and understanding that things are different now because I’m a parent. Maybe they understand because they are parents too, or maybe they aren’t, but truthfully, you shouldn’t be the scapegoat. I want to be a better friend, but I just don’t know how.

I’m afraid one day the forgiveness will stop and the “lol” will too, and one day I’ll be left on read. I’m afraid I’ll be a good dad, a decent husband, with no friends. I’m afraid I’ll be the best dad, but I’ll be lonely. That when I die, I’ll be survived by the memories of “Marc and I used to be good friends,” and all the memories will be in past tense—not because I’m gone, but because the only memories my friends will have to share are all old ones. Well, that got dark really quickly.

Hey, if you’re my friend and you’re reading this, I want you to know I love you, and thank you for loving me. Truthfully, I struggle with loving myself sometimes. Maybe that’s why I love being a dad and husband, because every day, even when I don’t feel it, I have a family that reminds me I’m worth loving. Myles, when you are able to read this and wonder why I have no friends, I want you to know it wasn’t your fault. I think I just didn’t know how to be a good friend.

But today, I’m declaring something new: I’ll be a better friend to my friends, and after reading this over and over again, it looks like I can start by being a better friend to myself.

I love ya’ll and there's nothing you can do about it.

Love,

Good dad, decent husband, and a friend in progress.

If you can’t commit to a monthly subscription, but still want to support Myles’ college plan, here is my Buy Me a Coffee page.

And if you are on Substack, please restack this letter and recommend it so I can share this love with the world.

Let me know your thoughts:

1. How do I be a better friend?

2. Have you ever missed an important date—birthday, anniversary—and how did you handle it?

3. What’s the strangest place you’ve ever found an everyday item—like yogurt in the spice cabinet?

4. Do you feel like some people want community, or just a “kingdom” where everything revolves around them?

5. How do you balance loving others with loving yourself?

6. Have you ever felt like you were surviving on grace from others more than showing up for them?

Leave a comment

Want more of Myles’ Letters?

These are Subscriber’s favorites:

• They Say When Man Makes a Plan, God Laughs.

• Myles met his Grandfather in Brooklyn, NY

• Read about Our first Father’s Day.

• A video about beautiful backgrounds: Tell Them Where You're From.

• Read about My Wife’s Love Affair - It’s exactly what you don’t think

• Have you ever been Cooking in the Bathroom kind of tired?

• Check out Carrying the Gift, Holding the Love

I write letters to my newborn son, Myles, sharing my journey as a first-time dad and spreading the love I didn't experience myself. If you’ve been here before — thank you for coming back. If you’re new here, here are some good places to start.

• Am I a Good Dad, or is the Bar Just Really Low?

• My Wife’s Love Affair - It’s exactly what you don’t think

• Three Months after I Met Your Mother

• How I Proposed to Your Mother

Dear Myles,

We do not curse at home, but damn, if I weren’t t too worried about what your mother thinks of me, our pastor, and all the Jesus-believers I know who probably curse on the low too (what up, SDA)—this is how I wanted to bust down the doors of the daycare we are paying a whole lot for, full of fire, fury, frustration, and ferocity, shouting, Who taught my son the F-word?!

That morning, we were getting you ready for school. I was in the kitchen cleaning up after breakfast while your mother was getting you dressed. This is our daily routine. We just grunt and point in the morning—too tired for anything else, too tired for verbs. “You food, me baby.” I cook, she finds clothes. I clean dishes, she dresses you. Obviously, we don’t actually talk like that at home (I don’t even know why I feel the need to say that).

But I do love hearing her talk to you when I am not even in the room. She says all the things I think every child needs to hear. And it is not the usual affirmation stuff, like “You can do anything you put your mind too.” No. Right now, if a stranger walked into the house and overheard the conversation, they might not even realize she was talking to a two-year-old.

“Tell me, what do you want to wear today? Can you tell me what we are going to do today, Myles?” No close-ended questions—just wide-open ones. And it is never, “Do you want this or that?” It’s, “What do you think about this or that?” That is open-ended too, because what matters is that your voice already matters. You’ve got options, a whole lot more than I had as a two year old.

Anyway, I am washing dishes when I hear it, but I am not sure. I try never to assume, because in this house there’s always a high probability that I’m wrong. By this point, you know I married up—I married someone much smarter than myself.

But then your mother called out, “Marc, you heard that?” And I knew this time was different. This time, I wished I was wrong.

I came into the living room, and she started explaining what my ears had heard but my eyes hadn’t fully processed.

“I don’t know,” she began, with just a touch of worry in her voice. “I was just taking off his shirt, and he pointed at himself and then said…”

She paused, then started spelling the word you had said just a minute before—the same one I was sure I heard from the kitchen.

She spelled it out, just like we do with all the forbidden words we never say in front of you:

C-A-N-D-Y,

N-A-P,

C-O-O-K-I-E.

And to be honest, I get a little emotional piecing together the letters as she mouths them slowly, reading her lips.

What. How? No, not this early, I think to myself.

I couldn’t have learned it this early. It had to be later.

I remember fifth grade. It was picture day. I always hated picture day. Why did we need to take these class photos every year? It was almost the same group of kids every time. I remember thinking, Do we really need another one?

My skin can still feel the itchiness of the thick sweaters I was forced to wear, and the prep your grandmother gave me to smile.

But now, because I know what I know, and apparently things only make sense when you become a parent, you’ll be doing picture day every year too, minus the itchy sweaters, of course.

So, we are lining up: shortest kids in the front, sitting criss-cross applesauce, tallest kids next, and the middle kids on the stairs. I’m lucky; I just made it onto the chair right at the end, not so lucky because that means I would be right next to where my teacher, Ms. C would stand.

And for the first time, we would be shoulder to shoulder. Ms. C was the kind of teacher who was so beautiful but so mean—in my fifth-grade boy logic, that made her ugly. Looking back now, I realize Ms. C just cared. But she was the kind of teacher who’d call your house when you did wrong, and on parent-teacher conference night, she’d make your grandparents’ belts start to uncoil right then and there.

But surely, on picture day, she’d smile—just this once in her life—and not in the way she really wanted to tear us up.

She walked over to join me after telling all of us to stay close and make sure we smiled. Then she saw me—looked me up and down in a way I still can’t forget, even twenty-something years later.

She fixed her gaze at the base of my chair, like I shouldn’t be there. And then, for some reason, she pulled at the seams of my pants.

I was confused. It couldn’t be because I was sagging my pants—because I’m Haitian. There is no such thing as sagging when you’re Haitian. No, we wear our pants high— higher than the pride of Haitian mothers who can dish jokes faster than they can kwit diri, but are slower to remind you how much they love you more than the belt that’s on fire. Because I would have caught fire if my pants dared to drift below my waist.

Is it too high? I thought to myself. Ms. C pulled my seams with such vigor, it made the chair I was standing on wobble. Then her eyes followed up my seams, skipped my waist, and locked into my eyes with a look of confusion and a tinge of disgust. And then she said it: “Why are your pants so tight?”

That was exactly the first time I felt the weight of the words we heard you say that day—the same words we never taught you, the same words your mother spelled out:

F-A-T.

“Where did you learn that word, Myles?” I asked so softly that the breath still attached to your name barely escaped my mouth. I tried to mask what I was feeling inside so you wouldn’t pick up any clues that this word was not okay.

But inside, like most people who can’t easily process sadness and pain, my body, my brain really wanted to run up to your school that morning with some real fire and demand answers.

Because you’re too smart. It’s no coincidence you said it as soon as your mother took your shirt off. You already know your ABCs, 123s, shapes, and colors in two languages. You know more words than you can count—literally.

Because it’s too soon. You are only two. It happened to me when I was ten.

I remember when we first got those pants. We were in Flatbush, Brooklyn, heading to Cookies. We went every year.

I remember the first time my mother, your grandmother, told me we were going to Cookies—I was excited. What kid wouldn’t be? A store named Cookies sounded like every child’s dream.

But to my dismay, this store didn’t sell cookies. It didn’t even smell like sugar. When we finally reached the corner where Cookies stood, I looked up and read the sign—small font, right under the big red and blue letters that spelled out Cookies: Girls, boys, teens, shoes, infants, toys, school uniform.

That was the first time I learned what false advertising was. We weren’t here for sweets, we were here for school uniforms. And ever since that day, I hated shopping for school uniforms. I hated back-to-school season.Even now, the very beginning of August, the sight of a back-to-school aisle still makes me a little nauseous. My body just knew school was coming (hard to believe after all this I still became a teacher).

So here we are, another year, another August, in a store named Cookies, with no cookies in sight, and no no cake either.

I’m trying on pants after pants, and nothing fits. And to me, I’m not thinking it’s me—I’m thinking maybe my mom doesn’t know my size. I don’t know. I’m in the fifth grade. What fifth grader knows his size?

I’m thinking maybe this store should really consider selling cookies, because clearly if you don’t have my size why are you in business?

We keep walking.

And then I find a pair of pants—me, not my mother. They feel different from the others. A little tougher, firmer to the touch. And they have a logo that grabs my attention the moment I see it: the silhouette of a big dog. Not the kind of dog I had ever seen in Brooklyn. Na, this was a dog I had only ever seen on TV.

Underneath the silhouette, in bold letters, it said: Husky.

I grabbed the first pair from the stack, ignoring the dimensions. Like I said, I didn’t know my size anyway.

For the first time, I went to the dressing room, and when my mom called out, “How’s it fit?” I smile and tell her, “It’s good.”

They were not too long, not too tight. I did not have to sqeeze my thighs so much into them like my other pants. And best of all—I had never seen another kid at school wearing Husky.

They ain’t never heard of no Husky, I thought to myself.

Maybe Cookies did not need to sell sweets after all.

So when the teacher pulled at my pants, I knew it wasn’t because my mom didn’t know my size, or because I was a fifth grader. It was because I was fat.

Or at least, that’s how it felt.

It wasn’t until later that I learned Husky wasn’t just a brand—it was a size. A category. It was made for kids built like me: shorter, stockier. And back then, “stockier” just meant fat.

And it’s one thing for a fifth-grade boy to wonder if something is wrong with his own body— It’s a whole different thing to have that suspicion confirmed by a teacher.

Looking back now, maybe she didn’t mean it the way it came out. Maybe she didn’t know better. But over twenty-something years later, that’s still how my body remembers it.

And that’s why I spent years playing sports, going to gyms, lifting—trying to make sure no one would ever make me feel like that again.

Because even though nothing was ever wrong with the way I looked, no one taught me early on to love it.

No one told me I was fearfully and wonderfully made.

No one told me that even if my thighs had to squeeze into pants sometimes, it didn’t mean something was wrong with me.

So when I saw your mother spell those words out, I almost wished it had been an expletive instead.

I wish this had not happened so soon.
Because you are only two.

I want to sit down with everyone in our lives, every teacher, uncle, grandparent, aunty, and ’nem—and let them know:

We need to protect you at all costs.
We need to shield you for as long as we can.

Because I know society does not want to believe it, but boys—boys like you, and boys like me—are fragile.

And if we do not recognize that boys need more love, more patience, and yes, more hugs than their sisters
we risk doing more harm than good.

At that meeting, I want to remind them of all the things we have to prepare you for in a world that may never fully receive your beauty.

Because no matter how much we remind you at home that you are handsome and brilliant,
someone out there can pull at any one of those seams
and undo everything we are building.

My son,

Even though you have only said those words once—and I do not know if you picked them up from daycare,
or from the aunty who lovingly calls you her little fatman—
I want you to know:

You are not fat, but even if you were, you’d still be fucking beautiful.

I love you, and there is nothing you can do about it.

Love,
Daddy

If you can’t commit to a monthly subscription, but still want to support Myles’ college plan, here is my Buy Me a Coffee page.

And if you are on Substack, please restack this letter and recommend it so I can share this love with the world.

Let me know your thoughts:

1. What’s a moment when your child surprised you with something you never expected them to say or do?

2. What’s one “parenting challenge” that caught you completely off guard?

3. When was the first time you remember feeling insecure about your own body or appearance? What triggered it?

4. Who or what has most shaped your understanding of respect and boundaries growing up?

5. Too many GiFs?

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