Happy Father’s Day!

Photo of my father, wandering the village of his grandfather

Thinking About Fathers by Katheryn Laible

Happy Father's Day!

Here is a photo of my own father, wandering through the village of his grandfather, telling stories about him, the mother he raised, his own father, and his father…

I am grateful for him, for them, for my sweet husband, and for all who give it their best to be good men and serve as fathers. It means more than I can say….Thank you!

Brief History

While inspired by its advent, Father’s Day wasn’t formalized until several decades after Mother’s Day. Apparently, it met resistance from dads who found the idea unmanly. Like Mother’s Day’s own founder, many moreover objected to the commercialization of the whole thing. Still, the sentiment runs deep and, in 1972, Richard Nixon finally signed a bill making it official. 

One poignant impetus for Father’s Day in the US was a memorial held in the wake of an awful mining disaster in Fairmont, West Virginia. More directly related to the celebration we know, was a campaign initiated by a woman named Sonora Smart Dodd. She was inspired by a sermon on Mother’s Day and the experience of her father, who raised her and her five siblings alone after their Mom passed in childbirth. Working with local religious leaders, in 1909 they dedicated June 19th (her father’s birthday month) to honoring all fathers. 

You can read about that and other fascinating bits in this Britannica entry, as well as in this History.com article, and in the Farmer’s Almanac.

A Few Resources

I love this collection of “The Best Quotes on Fatherhood” from The Art of Manliness…

Did you know there’s a National Fatherhood Initiative that since 1994 has been dedicated to helping communities and human service agencies foster fatherhood?

Another website, The National Center for Fathering, has been run by Drs. Ken and Michelle Watson Canfield since 1990, offering a wide array of resources and reflections designed to provide practical support to men who wish to be better fathers. 

 

Fatherly, produced by global media company BDG, seeks to “empower men to raise great kids and lead more fulfilling adult lives through original reporting, expert parenting advice, and hard-won insights.”

Thank You - For This Guy and Everyone Else Giving it Their Best

Personally, I am really, super grateful for all who step up to serve in a fathering role. This especially includes all those folks who for one reason or another end up wearing both mother and father hats, and those who are determined to be the fathers they wish they had.  

One sweet and broadly helpful example is this guy, Rob Kenney who hosts “Dad, how do I?” on YouTube. Kenny’s dedicated to doing his “best to provide useful, practical content to many basic tasks that everyone should know how to do.” He started out just trying to do it for his own kids, and now we all benefit.

There are so many guys like this, and so many others who give more of themselves than they knew they had to uplift and serve the next generations. Oh, the stories we could tell…Grateful to have witnessed some of them. It means more than we may realize. 

Grateful!

Happy New Year! Here Are Some Resources

Photo of sparkler with heart shaped core by Katheryn Laible

Photo “New Year’s Love” by Katheryn Laible

Happy New Year! We hope you’ve enjoyed a very Merry Christmas, that Hannukah was bright and that you take comfort in the Solstice knowing that — while winter is indeed upon us — the darkest days have already passed. Whatever you celebrate, may it be something good and bring you deep joy. Come what may, we wish you all the best. 

We thought you might appreciate the following:

Let’s start with this fascinating piece on the history of New Year’s and its traditions from History.com

Want to go to a ball drop without going to the THE Ball Drop? Going Local Long Island has a whole list of local celebrations, including midnight spectacles and several events featuring a very family-friendly 8pm ball drop!  (We of The Firefly were delighted, btw, to win their first ever Local’s Choice Awards for best gallery. Thank you to all who voted for us! Even, better — since we know just getting nominated means something special — we are thrilled they listed 2nd and third place winners for their awards as well. Support these local treasures!)

In addition to one last hurrah for the old year, it’s also a time for introspection and planning. Here are “7 Questions to Ask Yourself for a Happier New Year, written by Jancee Dunn for the New York Times. It draws from a number of folks prominent in the field of self help as well as her own dad. (mind the paywall – please support quality journalism if you value it. You may also find this article at your local library!)

The website for the Calm app also has a lovely list of reflections that leads into a thoughtful approach to gentle, and thus likely more effective, resolution making 

Here are some other tips on actually sticking to those resolutions. from a neuroscientist named Nicholas Wright writing for Time Magazine. It’s got a good bit to do with breaking things down into manageable bites and staying loose in the face of unexpected obstacles and new information.   

The Myth of Maintenance, by Dr. Jeff Reynolds of the Family and Children’s Association, offers a little tough love to spice up all the rest of this, centering on the idea that, even if we’d simply like to maintain, we’re best off doing so from a mindset of innovation, growth and being willing to push ourselves. 

This is true. It’s also true that we have to be patient with ourselves if we are ever going to overcome the myriad frustrations that come with trying to get our human selves to maintain, let alone achieve great aspirations. Here’s a little help from Yasmin Ruffo in the BBC on doing that, entitled “The two words to avoid when making your New Year’s resolution.”

It doesn’t have to be hard. Here are “65 Achievable New Year’s Resolutions” from Good Housekeeping. 

One of those suggestions is to volunteer more. Many of us are thinking about how we can help out more, and are still doing year-end giving! Here’s a list of JUST A FEW incredible local organizations that could use our support. Use it as a starter guide. We look forward to sharing many more in the New Year!

Let us know your year-end reflections and resources, and what you’d like to see focused on in 2026. Thanks!!!

A Note on Science

Photo of an Antique Quack Medical Device by Katheryn Laible

Please...

You know…I’m never going to say that scientists aren’t prone to dogmatism or corruption, nor that money doesn’t direct a lot of focus and strong will. Certainly, there are plenty of non-scientists frequently willing to pass stuff off as scientifically verified that is just not…or who take some grain of discovered knowledge and just…run wild…

However, there is a huge difference between that and scientific consensus based on careful application of the empirical method and honest assessment of lots of carefully gathered data.

The Word "Science" Means Something

Scientists know they are funny subjective humans by nature and that objective reality is a tough thing to grasp, even without that. The whole point for folks who are truly scientists is to give it their best to overcome those biases, think really hard about how we might actually know what we know, and then carefully catalogue and analyze that, while repeatedly double checking each other and themselves.

A lot of folks aren’t diregarded as quacks because no one wants to look at their truth, but because they’ve examined it carefully and what they see is hogwash.

They may not not know precisely what is, but they’re qualified to give the best guess we’ve got and can often tell for sure when something doesn’t prove what someone else is claiming it does.

Please Honor Expertise.

If we’re willing to actually sit there and listen (keeping in mind that these folks have studied their fields and methodology in general for years and it can be a little hard to follow sometimes), they might even be willing to try and explain how they’ve come to these carefully derived conclusions, and the chances they think this or that may be so.

Grateful when folks actually care about that. It makes a big difference. 

Civic Education in Pockets & Purses

Since before I was born my mother has kept in her purse a copy of a booklet titled “American Legacy” put out by the Center for Civic Education that includes the Constitution and “other essential documents of American History.” It’s an idea fostered by my grandmother, a life long learner, both passionate about history and an English teacher by nature. This habit has become an almost symbolic practice: Taking the ideas our country is built on with you as you go, and not forgetting them in the way it’s so easy to do in the modern age.

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A Republic, If We Will Keep It

I’m thinking about what it really means to be a citizen of The United States of America, and this Great Experiment that is our system of government… this wild concept of a Representative Republic with all these checks and balances specifically designed to evade both Kings and ill-informed mobs, and to recognize the value of different perspectives, interests and expertise…

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A Grateful Prayer: Rise and Shine

Photo entitled “Angels in the Troposphere III” by Katheryn Laible

Good morning. Rise and shine! Grateful for all with calm heads, clear eyes, pure hearts and brave souls.

To all those willing and able to speak truth and shine light; humbly, gracefully, earnestly willing to give their best;

To all who understand the Golden Rule, the sacred secular hope of our Nation’s founding, the value of the scientific method and journalistic standards, the nuance of complex history, ethics/morality and just plain common decency… to all who will uplift and stand for those who honor them, and to all those who are bravely, honestly giving it their best to learn better and do better…

For all those willing to have compassion for, and comfort, and patiently yet firmly guide to better places all who are struggling and confused and displaced and frustrated and scared and distrustful and regretful and overwhelmed and completely misled and burnt out and totally traumatized… who isn’t, in one uniquely complex way or another?

Grateful to all who start with themselves and those they know and love best, wherever you are, whatever you happen to specialize in. Grateful to all who give their lives to serve others and who help us to help ourselves so we can better help others and work together to make it all better for everyone…grateful to all who tend their own little space with love and light.

For all who recognize our common souls and unique gifts and this beautiful miracle of a planet that sustains us, that we are responsible for, and which we share with so many other souls we’re only beginning to recognize — tragically broken and yet so worth mending — and for all who keep the faith; those who see the light in the darkness, and those who honestly build the faith that we are not alone in wanting things to work out for the best for this whole precious world.

For every creature who stands up for truth and love with honor and integrity because they know it’s the right thing to do; for all who give it their best to learn and to do better than they might have done before; grateful to all who will offer a hand on board to those brave enough to cast aside what they realize is wrong, and to all who stand and uphold whatever it is they know is right.

It matters so much. It really, really does. May God that is ultimate truth and love guide us all. Best with everything.

My Prayer: Rise and Shine

photo of bird rising over Cold Spring Harbor 2022

Photo entitled “Cold Spring Harbor: Rising 2022” by Katheryn Laible

I remember the wisest, sweetest, most incredible woman I know saying, “People pray for power. It is better that they will Love, for Love is the greatest power of All.”

I pray: May I remember her teachings well. May I understand them at least enough. May we together channel more than ourselves; manifest Love and Light.

Pray for Love. Pray for Truth. Truth and Love in equal measure

For as many before and after have somehow said, “Truth without Love is brutal, and Love without Truth is false.”

This has long made sense to me.
I am still learning that it takes a third leg: Faith. To make a sturdy table, we need Faith.

Faith, Faith, Faith

…to cast away fear, have faith…

“Nothing boils in lukewarm water,” she says…Remember to command, to commune, to comfort; to will
harmony in thy multifaceted being

…Truth, Love, Faith…

Faith in the Greater. Faith in each other. Faith that as we will it already is. Faith that this Flame I feel deep within is far from mine alone. Faith that you feel This, too.

Humble before God, equal before man, recognizing the God within and the human as well, each manifesting in its own way. May we will and channel Strength with Dexterity, Grace and Mercy. Open to the Greater Good without and within, in places that we do not know.

She reminds me, “There is no saint without a past and no sinner without a future” … “He loves you not for what you are but for what you are becoming.”

“Ho’oponopono. Ho’oponopono. Ho’oponopono,” I hear other voices say. She speaks to me of Lady Quan Yin.

They remind me to start on a path to Forgiveness, to Uplift, to Enlightenment with myself; to be grateful for every blessing and each accomplishment no matter how small, 

For the smallest is the greatest. For so little do we know, For we all know a little.

May we appreciate all that is Good, Humble and Grateful to be so blessed.  She advises Joyful Anticipation.
Discerning and Healing. Flexible and Strong. Reconciling.

Overcoming.

Divine.

Calling all who Will to Transmute the lesser,  To Receive, Accelerate and Amplify the Greater. Manifest Love. Be the Light. Keep the Faith.

This indigenous wise-woman who communes with All reminds me of St. Francis’ Prayer. “Let me be an Instrument of Thy Peace.”

Faithfully. Humbly. Gratefully. Evermore.

This I Pray. Namaste. Amem.

This piece was updated 3/26/23