Father’s Day is coming up in the United States. This month we feature a wistful story (“Five Times I Have Slept at Your Bedside” by Jared Adams) of a father who emulates this quote from William Shakespeare:

“It is a wise father who knows his own child.”

I sat and pondered on that quote for a while. I found a great deal of depth and layered meaning there.

I considered my own father and the relationship I have with him. My husband and the relationship he has with our children. My father-in-law, too. (I can’t consider my son. He hasn’t bothered to make me a grandmother yet.)

Shakespeare doesn’t say a happy father, or a fulfilled father. He says a wise father. He doesn’t say loves or appreciates. He says knows.

How does a father know his child? It’s more than simply love. It’s being there. It’s watching a child move through the phases of life with wonder, with awe, with hope and joy and expectation. It’s being caught by surprise when you seem to have blinked and the years have passed and the child is grown and waving goodbye, but realizing that the time has passed so swiftly not because you have missed the sweet moments of fatherhood, but because you have lived them and loved them and become a better person because of them.

Now that, my friends, is wisdom.

Happy Father’s Day to every man who has been there for a child.

The rest of this month’s stories are, well, kind of random, but I’m sure you’ll love them, too! I did.

Like Sarah Beaudette’s beautiful sci-fi story, “The Strawberry Queen of Irapuato.”

Or another strong sci-fi adventure, “Place Your Bets,” by David Whitaker.

Also this month, our featured reprint, with Irish harp (I love Irish harp), “Songs in the Key of Chamomile,” by FFO alum, Rebecca Birch.

Enjoy!