[Street Pharmacist]

At the end of the day, this:

I learned how to be a father when I lost my son at the mall

Their parents couldn't have been any more prepared than I was. They had to be just as lame, just as inexperienced, just as worried. And yet, against all odds, their kids had grown up.

For the next decade or so, I found solace in crowds. I’d sit at a baseball game, and when the attendance would be announced, something in my stomach would loosen. Another 26,212 people who’d made it past the slings and arrows, the meanness and innocence, the temptations and tempests of childhood. And I would sit back in my seat, put my arm around whatever kid I happened to have at the game with me and believe, perhaps against reason, that my children would outlive me.

And that is really the only Father’s Day wish that matters.

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