Men doing manly things.

Imagine those people in your life that you can be totally at ease with. You know the ones who you’ll never run out of conversation with and that when you’ve spent time with them you feel better, happier and somehow lighter. Your shoulders have dropped a couple of inches and you feel refreshed. Well, my Dad is one of those people for me. 


My parents divorced when I was nine. We had this slightly odd set up where my brother and I spent one week with Mum and another with Dad. We got used to it and it became normal for us and Dad was able to manage it because he had his own business so could be quite flexible with his working hours. 


He was different to other Dads I knew. He had to take me to buy school shoes and clothes. He had to plait my hair, iron my clothes, pick me up from school and look after me when I was poorly. When they were together my Mum had done all that kind of thing. I guess what I’m really trying to say is that he had to do all the Mum stuff as well as the Dad stuff. 


I think because he was a different kind of father it made our relationship different. I could talk to him just as easily as I could my Mum. In fact if I’m honest, more easily both then and now.


He eventually got re-married, to my Godmother actually, but that’s a whole other story, but things between us didn’t really change and we always stayed close even when they spent ten years living in France and Spain. Now he’s back in the UK and only lives 10 mins away and I didn’t realise how much I’d missed having him around for those years until he came back.


Dad seems to have stepped into his role as Grandad Limited pretty well too. Strangely, when I was pregnant he seemed totally uninterested but as Mini Mck has gained more of his own personality Dad has become totally enamoured with him. I love watching them together as he just seems to light up and I’ve noticed just recently that Mini Mck is very insistent that Grandad carries him when he’s around.


What makes this even nicer for me is seeing how the men in my life get along with each other. Dad and Mckdaddy really seem to enjoy each others company. They go with my brother to the football and they built our kitchen together, although I’m not sure either of them particularly enjoyed that. They seem to be at ease with each other and in the same way that Dad and I never run out of things to chat about, they don’t either. 


I took these shots at the new allotment he is sharing with Mckdad. I had visions of lots of lovely portrait shots of my Dad but it turns out that allotment work involves lots of frowning and pulling funny faces as you try to bend the natural world to your own will, in a manly type way. Perhaps not the best photos I’ve ever taken but I think they get across what I’m getting at. So, here are the men in my life (and a little boy thrown in for good measure) doing manly outdoor things.

This post is part of The Gallery at Sticky Fingers.