Let Daddy Rock

While there is no question in my mind that Neal Pollack is the shit, I understand the arguments of those who would criticize his “different” methods of parenting. I don’t see his problem surrounding his relationship with his wife so much as on his concern with the sacrifice of his individuality to settled-down, docile fatherhood. As Jana pointed out, while Pollack is rightly concerned about the health and wellbeing of his family, he engages in what some find to be self-destructive behavior—partying, drinking, pot smoking etc.: “this is just wrong behavior for a dad like symbol.” However, I find that Pollack’s whole conflict involves avoiding the compromise of this punk-rock lifestyle, which he feels is integral to his personality as a rebellious, alternative-minded “artiste,” by letting it fall into the stereotypical portrayal of the traditional family: “Class guilt oozed from my every pore. I wanted to say… ‘These are but trappings of yuppiedom! It’s not who I am in my soul! But I was no longer cool’” (113). As the new routine of fatherhood takes its form, Pollack laments his loss of coolness, and must fight to gain that sense again, whether it be to shop for indie clothes for his son or become a kick-ass rock star.

Regina shares Pollack’s wish to be a cool and different kind of parent, even if she is more pragmatic or “healthy” in the way she goes about it. Pollack writes, “we would be cool parents…we would not succumb to the cult of child rearing; our kid was not going to be our excuse to retreat from the wider world. He would be our passport and we would be his” (113). But Regina undoubtedly calls all the shots, or most of them, and where Amanda applauded his glorification of his wife during and after her pregnancy, I saw his sometimes “pathetic” role to be typical of the fathers in the Bitch in the House—sad, helpless men whose only escape from the torments of family life were to either keep away or just become “yes-men”: “I had one job: to nod and say ‘Yes, dear,’ to whatever she wanted” (73). Wouldn’t it have been enough to have Neal there at the birthing? Why was it necessary to have the Doula? Was it because Pollack was incapable of being supportive or emotionally helpful? Somehow, I thought that Pollack was treated somewhere between being placated and patronized solely based on the fact that he wasn’t a female and couldn’t “relate.” The annoyed looks the women exchanged at his attempts at understanding could have been more useful if they had been followed by explanations. Pollack seems endearingly desperate to learn about parenthood so that he can at last be seen as not just a disappointment, but some sort of authority: “I actually craved the responsibility that fatherhood would bring. I liked the idea that people would be dependent on me. I’d felt like the employee, the son or the clownish afterthought my entire adult life. It was time for me to prove that I could take the ship’s tiller” (62). He is genuinely stoked about Daddyhood.

In addition to all of the “serious” issues the book raises in regard to contemporary parenthood, I think Alternadad, at least so far, is a very enjoyable book. Apart from being a very good writer, Pollack obviously shares many of my core values (e.g. hanging out in Philly with eccentric folks and starting rock bands because it just needs to be done), and has a killer sense of humor: "It is generally not a good idea to tell a woman you're in love with her while she's breaking up with you" (24). But he doesn’t merely value these things because they are counter-culture or whatever, they are just a part of who he is, and he even has a somewhat mature understanding of his otherwise adolescent views: “Aesthetics matter a little bit, but they weren’t all that mattered. Eccentricity is not a virtue unto itself” (18). As a product of the “Indie” age loaded with gnarly music, yuppie-hating, beer swigging, dirty coffee-house culture, Pollack is an unlikely candidate for “family man”. This fact, however, merely makes Alternadad all that more compelling a read, for when and if I decide to have kids, I want to do it a lot like Neal Pollack. Minus the moving to Texas part. (Texas? What?!) Rock on.