Father’s Day: A Journey into the Mind and Heart of My Extraordinary Son
Written and Narrated By: Buzz Bissinger
Length: 8 hrs and 55 mins
Lovely sons, but BOY is Buzz a despicable father and human being, or what?!?
I dunno, but I was kinda hoping that the second time around Father’s Day would be better. I was thinking that perhaps I’d see Buzz as more human, more warm, like he was really, really, REALLY trying to do the best for his son, but that maybe Life had given him more Xs than gold star stickers.
Uhm, noooooo!!! Jiminy H. Cricket, the man is a vile mess! It’d be one thing if he was just a miserable human being on his own, but nooooo! The man spreads his discontent.
Okay, so this is supposed to be a warm story of a road trip with his youngest twin boy, Zach. Both Zach and older twin, Gerry, were born premature, but Zach was born with profound disabilities.
And Bissinger canNOT get over it. The road trip is about him NOT seeing Zach for the wonderful young man he is—a lovely, friendly, caring young man who, yes DOES have quirks and annoying habits but JAYSUS Buzz! Let it go and look at how blessed you’ve been! Jeeeeeez!
Seriously! I’ve spent the past 30 years working with kids with disabilities, and Zach is by NO means a hard case! The way you hear Buzz talk about Zach (For almost 9 HOURS!), you’d think Zach was wearing a diaper and spent his days in a fetal position! I’ve seen THAT! And here we have sweet Zach, who yes, needs a bit of guidance with his jobs BUT he CAN work; he has special friendships; he has interests; he’s pretty funny.
So excuse me, Buzz, if I don’t get why you can’t look at your youngest son and see him for the capable human being he is and NOT as the humongous disappointment you’re set on viewing him as.
Father’s Day is almost 9 hours of Buzz yelling at Zach. He yells at him in the car; he yells at him in motels; he yells at him in restaurants. Buzz goes to great lengths to explains to us, the listeners, that he’s being very honest and candid, that yes, this is Buzz Bissinger the Dad. I appreciate honesty, but I felt there was a certain sense of pride in how “honest” he was being, that he kinda got a perverse pleasure in showing himself to be the total a-hole he is.
If you’re up for HOURS of Buzz getting big ideas, yelling, trying to back out of ideas, yelling, backing out of ideas and making it all other people’s fault, yelling—go for it! But if you’re looking for sudden epiphanies that: Gee, I have beautiful kids, my life might not be so bad after all? Forget it.
As for Buzz reading it to us himself? Well, he spews his own venom so very well that I felt I’d been chewed up and spat out with nary a thought. So Bravo to him for conveying his anger and sense of worldly injustice so well.
Me? Oh, do I have to say it?
I did the 9 hours… TWICE. Now? I’m soooooo outta here!
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