The Father Who Never Had One

The father who never had one received a call.

Maybe he was at work. Maybe surrounded by friends or family. Maybe he was alone.

Mother asked him a question.

“Guess what?”

“You won the Lotto?” Father responded.

“No, silly.”

There was a pause. Father could hear Mother breathing through the phone.

Then she said it.

“You’re going to be a father!”

The father who never had one paused. For a few seconds… he didn’t say anything.

“Hello?”

Mother waited.

“Did you hear me?”

Father heard her. Something had moved inside him before he could find the words for it.

He stopped whatever he was doing.

“Where are you?”

Mother sent him her location. Father left without explaining much to anybody around him.

On the way there, he couldn’t stop smiling. One or two tears eventually made their way down his face.

He wiped them.

Then said the words to himself again.

“I’m going to be a father.”

And in the months that followed… Father was there.

When Mother needed help moving around the house, Father helped. He went with her to appointments. He listened as doctors spoke about the baby.

He worried when something didn’t feel right. He celebrated when they were told everything was fine.

As Mother’s stomach grew… fatherhood slowly stopped being something waiting somewhere in the future.

Then the day arrived.

Mother went into labour.

Father was there through the contractions. He was there through the waiting.

And when the child finally entered the world… Father was there too.

Friends and family celebrated the newborn. Phones came out. Pictures were taken. Congratulations filled the room.

Someone placed the baby in Father’s arms.

Father looked down.

The child moved slightly against him.

He smiled.

For the first time in his life… there was somebody in the world who would know him as Father.

And for that moment… that was enough.

Looking back now, perhaps that was the moment something larger quietly began. The man holding his child was not only becoming Father. Somewhere underneath the smile, the tears and everything he still had to learn was a boy stepping into a role he had never experienced from the other side. He would have to discover what Father meant while already being one… explored deeper in The Boy Who Became Father.

When Fatherhood Became Ordinary

As the father who never had one adapted to fatherhood… he began writing his own chapter.

He was there for the doctor’s appointments with Mother. He was there when his child first learned to crawl.

Then eventually… walk.

Some days, Father chose spending time with his child over going out with the gang.

He taught the child how to play different sports. How to assemble puzzles. Perhaps even how to look at a problem differently when the first answer didn’t work.

Mother and Father slowly developed their own rhythm.

Sometimes Mother handled things. Sometimes Father did.

And as the years moved… Fatherhood became less like something Father was learning and more like ordinary life.

The bond between Father and his child grew. So much that on some evenings… the child would fall asleep on Father’s chest.

One evening, Father looked down.

The child was completely asleep.

Father smiled.

He leaned forward and kissed the child’s forehead.

Then paused.

For a few seconds… he simply looked.

At the small face. The closed eyes. The child sleeping peacefully against him.

Father smiled again.

He was proud of the man he had become. Proud of the father he was becoming.

Looking back now, perhaps Father had never stopped to think about how much of himself was slowly becoming attached to that role. Being there. Teaching. Protecting. Becoming the person his child could depend on. To the child sleeping peacefully against his chest, he was simply Father. But underneath everything that name had come to mean… there was still a man carrying a story of his own… explored deeper in The Man Behind Father.

Then something moved inside him.

Father didn’t immediately understand what.

His smile remained… but one tear slowly made its way down his face.

Father wiped it away.

He looked at the child again. Then rested his head back.

The child continued sleeping.

Nothing else happened.

And Father didn’t go looking for an explanation.

When His Child Became His Age

After work, Mother went over to the father who never had one.

Father had just changed out of his work clothes and into whatever he normally wore around the house. He sat on the edge of the bed, telling Mother about something that had happened at work.

Mother stood behind him, gently massaging his shoulders as he spoke.

Then she interrupted.

“Sorry to interrupt, but our child is turning seven tomorrow.”

Father looked at her.

“And it’s their Grade 1 birthday. What are we going to do?”

Father paused.

Something moved inside him. Something old.

He ignored it.

Then smiled.

“I have an idea.”

Mother waited.

“How about I hire a jumping castle? You work on the party packets…and we’ll invite the friends.”

Mother smiled.

“Okay.”

Father didn’t stop there.

He ordered a cake with the child’s name on it. He organised the jumping castle. And eventually decided to hire someone to record the day.

The following afternoon, the house was full.

Children ran everywhere. Some climbed onto the jumping castle wearing nothing but their swimming costumes. Others came sliding down into the water section.

Then climbed straight back up again.

Music played in the background. Parents sat around talking. Food was served.

Father moved between everything… occasionally stopping when someone called him.

“Dad!”

He turned.

Snap.

Another photograph.

Later, everybody gathered around the cake.

Seven candles.

They sang happy birthday. The child blew them out. Everyone clapped.

The cake was sliced.

Then the children disappeared back towards the jumping castle.

By the end of the afternoon… the music stopped. The jumping castle was switched off.

Friends went home. Family members said their goodbyes.

Eventually, only Father, Mother and their child remained.

Father and Mother cleaned what was left behind.

When they finished, they looked at each other.

Mother smiled.

“We pulled it off.”

Father laughed.

They hugged.

Then kissed.

Somewhere on a camera was an entire day their child would one day be able to watch again.

Maybe when they were eighteen.

Thirty.

Maybe one day they would show the footage to children of their own.

Later that night, Father helped his exhausted seven-year-old into bed. The child could barely keep their eyes open.

Father pulled the blanket over them.

“Did you enjoy your birthday?”

The child smiled.

“Yes.”

Within minutes… they were asleep.

Father stood up.

He walked towards the light switch.

Then stopped.

Something moved inside him again.

The same thing he had felt when Mother mentioned the birthday the night before.

Only this time… a memory came with it.

Father remembered being seven.

He remembered his own Grade 1 year.

Then… his own seventh birthday.

There was no jumping castle in the memory. No camera following him around. No Father moving through the background.

What Father remembered most clearly was how quiet that day had felt.

He stood beside the light switch looking at his sleeping child.

For years, that birthday had been buried somewhere among thousands of other childhood days.

Now… standing inside his child’s seventh birthday had somehow returned him to his own.

Father looked at the child.

Then a question followed.

Not about the party.

Not about the cake.

Not about anything that happened that day.

A much older question.

Why?

Father remained there.

Then another one came.

Did I do something wrong?

Father switched off the light.

He walked back to his bedroom. Climbed into bed beside Mother.

And eventually… went to sleep.

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The Question Father Couldn’t Answer

The father who never had one fetched his child from school.

The usual routine.

Father would pick the child up at around 14:15. Then drop them off somewhere they could wait under supervision before Father returned to work.

On the rare days Father couldn’t make it… Mother made another plan.

It had been their family system for a year or two.

Then one afternoon, Father picked up his child.

Routine kicked in.

“How was your day?”

The child responded the way children normally do.

“It was fun. But Themba and Junior were fighting again because Themba did this and then Junior…”

Father laughed.

A few minutes into the story, Father noticed something.

Not one word had been said about schoolwork.

“So what did you actually learn today?”

“Oh yes!”

The child suddenly remembered.

“We did something interesting.”

Father listened.

“The teacher told us to make family-tree collages. We were cutting pictures from magazines and pasting everything onto A3 paper.”

The child continued explaining.

“So I put you and Mother here.”

Their hands moved as though the family tree was sitting in front of them.

“Then under Mother, I put Grandma and Grandpa.”

A pause.

“But under you…”

The child looked at Father.

“I only put Grandma.”

Father continued driving.

“Daddy?”

“Hmm?”

“Where is Grandpa?”

Father’s hands remained on the steering wheel.

“I don’t know Grandpa.”

Something moved inside Father again.

For a moment… he seemed to disappear somewhere inside his own thoughts.

Then returned.

“Grandpa isn’t here, my child. Just put Grandma, okay?”

The child wasn’t finished.

“But if Grandpa isn’t here, where is he?”

Father kept driving.

Another question followed.

“Did you and Grandpa also play games like we do?”

Father said nothing.

The child waited.

The car moved slightly faster.

“Father?”

Silence.

“I asked you a question.”

Father’s voice suddenly rose.

“I said he isn’t here, okay?”

The child went quiet.

“I don’t know where your Grandpa is. Just listen to me and put Grandma.”

Silence filled the car.

Father looked towards his child.

The questions had stopped.

The child was sitting differently now.

Quiet.

Father looked at their face.

And something about the expression felt familiar.

He had seen it before.

Not on his child.

Somewhere much further back.

Looking back now, perhaps Father recognised more than an expression on his child’s face. For a moment, the person sitting quietly beside him may have reminded him of another child who once learned to read the atmosphere around the adults in the room. A child who watched reactions, noticed silences and carried questions they didn’t always know how to ask… explored deeper in The Child Who Watched.

Father’s hands loosened slightly around the steering wheel.

He slowed the car down.

“Hey…”

The child looked at him.

“I’m sorry.”

Father paused.

“I shouldn’t have shouted at you.”

The child remained quiet.

Father searched for something else to say.

“We’ll talk about Grandpa one day when you’re older, okay?”

“Okay.”

A few minutes later, another conversation slowly replaced the first one.

Something about school.

Perhaps Themba and Junior again.

Eventually, Father dropped the child off.

“Bye, Daddy.”

“Bye.”

Father watched until the child was safely inside.

Then he pulled away.

He returned to work. Sat down. Opened whatever he had been working on before leaving to fetch his child.

And tried to continue his day.

But every now and then… one question from the car returned.

Not:

Where is Grandpa?

Not even:

Did you and Grandpa play games together?

It was the question Father had been unable to answer at all.

Why don’t I know Grandpa?

Father stared at what was in front of him.

His child had only been trying to complete a family tree.

But somewhere between school and the afternoon drop-off… Father had discovered an empty space on his child’s page that had started long before his child was born.

The Boy the Father Who Never Had One Started Remembering

What people called this year’s calendar eventually became last year’s calendar.

It hung on the wall for a little longer than it probably should have.

Then one afternoon… it found itself in the dustbin along with some of the other old things Mother had thrown away during spring cleaning.

Another year had passed.

The father who never had one was somewhere around the house with his child.

Maybe outside in the yard… teaching them how to ride a bicycle.

Father held onto the back as the child pedalled.

“I’m going to let go in three seconds.”

“No!”

Father laughed.

“You’ve got this. Just keep pedalling!”

Or maybe they were inside.

Two controllers in their hands. FC loaded on the television.

Father looked across at his child.

“Let’s see if you can take me on this time.”

The child laughed.

“I’m going to beat you.”

“We’ll see.”

From somewhere down the passage, Mother could hear them.

One older voice. One younger voice.

Arguing over a goal. Laughing. Accusing each other of cheating.

Mother smiled and shook her head as she walked past.

Life had continued.

The father who never had one and his child rarely spoke about what had happened in the car that afternoon.

Grandpa returned to wherever the family had kept him all those years.

Father had promised his child they would talk about him one day… when the time was right.

And Father kept that promise safely somewhere in the future.

But something from that afternoon followed him.

Perhaps it had always been there. Hiding in plain sight.

The difference was… Father could see it now.

After teaching his child how to ride a bicycle… Father would put the bicycle away.

And sometimes remember being the same age.

He remembered wanting one too.

He remembered asking.

He remembered waiting.

The bicycle never came.

Another evening, Father would sit beside his child with a controller in his hands.

And somewhere between one match and the next… he would remember asking for a TV game when he was young.

That never came either.

Then Christmas would arrive.

Lights around the house. New clothes. A few toys. Food being prepared. Family moving in and out.

Mother calling everybody together because somebody still needed to take the family picture.

Father would stand beside his child.

Smile at the camera.

Snap.

Another Christmas preserved somewhere.

And sometimes… Father would remember Christmas when he was the same age.

Not every memory was bad.

There were people around him. People who cared for him. People who did what they could.

But some Christmases simply passed.

No lights.

No family picture.

Sometimes it felt like another day.

Father had lived with those memories for years.

They hadn’t stopped him from growing up.

He went to school. Became a man. Found Mother. Built a life. Became Father.

For most of his life… he rarely stopped to think about them.

Research into the intergenerational transmission of parenting suggests that becoming a parent does not always begin with a completely blank page. Some of the experiences people had with caregivers while growing up can remain connected to how they later respond to children of their own… explored further in research on the intergenerational transmission of parenting.

But now his child was reaching ages Father had already lived through.

And ordinary moments had started doing something strange.

A bicycle was no longer only a bicycle.

Christmas was no longer only Christmas.

A school project was no longer only a school project.

Sometimes Father would look at his child enjoying something… and another child would quietly enter the memory.

A child who also wanted things.

A child who also asked questions.

A child who eventually learned to stop asking some of them.

Looking back now, perhaps the things Father carried from childhood were not limited to what he could remember receiving or never receiving. Somewhere inside those years were lessons about what to expect, what not to ask for and what a boy eventually learns to live without. Some things are passed from Father to child without ever being deliberately handed over… explored deeper in What My Father Passed Down.

Father knew that child.

He hadn’t thought about him in years.

From outside, a voice interrupted him.

“Daddy!”

Father looked up.

His child was waiting.

“Are you coming?”

Father smiled.

“I’m coming.”

He walked towards his child.

And life continued.

But every now and then… while watching his child grow up… the father who never had one started remembering the boy he used to be.

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Conclusion: The Father Who Never Had One

The father who never had one continued being Father.

There were still school runs. Bills that needed to be paid. Doctor’s appointments. Birthdays. Christmases. Homework. Arguments. Laughter.

And ordinary evenings where nothing important seemed to happen.

His child continued growing.

And Father continued showing up.

Perhaps that was always what he believed fatherhood would be.

Being there.

Providing.

Protecting.

Teaching.

Giving his child some of the things he never had.

And for years… that was enough.

Father never needed to sit down and investigate his childhood.

He never needed to decide whether it had been good or bad.

It was simply his childhood.

He survived it. Grew from it.

And eventually… left it behind.

Or at least… Father thought he did.

Because nobody told him that becoming a father would sometimes take him back there.

Nobody told him that one day his child would turn seven… and Father would remember being seven.

That his child would ask about Grandpa… and Father would suddenly hear questions he had stopped asking years ago.

That teaching his child how to ride a bicycle could remind him of the bicycle that never came.

Or that standing beside his own family during Christmas could return him to Christmases he had almost forgotten.

None of these moments changed the past.

Grandpa was still Grandpa.

Father still didn’t have every answer.

Maybe he never would.

And the people who had been there for Father were still part of his story too.

The people who fed him. Raised him. Protected him.

Loved him in whatever ways they knew how.

Fatherhood didn’t erase any of that.

It simply showed Father something he hadn’t expected to see.

Sometimes… while looking at his child… Father could see himself.

Not the man he had become.

Not the provider.

Not Mother’s partner.

Not Father.

The boy.

Looking back now, perhaps that boy had never disappeared as completely as Father believed. He had simply continued growing beneath everything that came afterwards. School. Adulthood. Mother. Work. Responsibility. Fatherhood. Each year added another version of him… but somewhere underneath them all remained the person those earlier years had already started shaping… explored deeper in The Person You Keep Becoming.

The one who had also been seven.

The one who had also wanted things.

The one who had also asked questions.

The one who eventually grew old enough to stop asking some of them.

For years… Father believed becoming a father would finally allow him to give somebody what he never received.

And perhaps… he was right.

But as his child continued growing… Father began discovering something else.

He hadn’t realised that while raising one child… he would keep remembering another.

A boy he thought he had left somewhere in childhood.

A boy who grew up.

Became a man.

And eventually became somebody’s Father.

The father who never had one looked at his child.

His child looked back at him.

And somewhere between the two of them… Father was slowly meeting the boy who never had one too

Mpumelelo Ncwana writes about the psychology behind decisions, identity, and the systems that shape behaviour.