Duncan Garner: An open letter to my son – and the stuff no one warns fathers about
Duncan Garner on facing empty nest syndrome: "One day you’re buckling them into a car seat. The next, they’re asking for the keys." Photo / Supplied
Dear Buster,
I really hope you read this letter. If not today – and I know your mind is on other things, as it should be – then at some stage. Most of the time we’re pretty open with each other, but as men, we also keep stuff to ourselves, so here’s my attempt at getting it all out there.
I want to tell you a few important things.
First, this is a big weekend for you. You’ve worked tremendously hard to get here. This afternoon you will run out for your first 1A rugby game for Mt Albert Grammar School against Auckland Grammar.
That sentence alone stops me in my tracks because it really means something to me. It wasn’t long ago you were a little bloke with a rugby ball under one arm, a fishing rod in the other, and a thousand daily questions and observations. You’d fall asleep driving home and it slowly got harder to carry you inside.
We always stuck together. You’d come everywhere with me. You were the boy who made ordinary errands feel like adventures. I felt proud then to call you my son and if it is possible, I feel even prouder today.
Admittedly, I’m slightly nervous and anxious because here you are, just Year 11 (fifth form to some of us), about to run into a testing and intimidating cauldron. Auckland Grammar, with all that history and aura and more All Blacks than anyone else.
I played them once. Three future All Blacks played for them that day, they beat us but not by much. Two arms, two legs. Forget reputations, they’re made to be broken (the reputations, not, I stress, the limbs). You know all this by now; we always talk about it.
So here you are, boots laced, shoulders broader, voice deeper, legs like tree trunks and a young man barely recognisable from the boy you were just a few years ago.
I admire your discipline, and what you want to achieve. You even have goals. Impressive. I know it must be tempting to go to those parties and smuggle in a few drinks, like some of your schoolmates have started to do, but you know what you want.