Fathers, Kissing Prodigal Sons

The Bidens, my daddy, and me

“Huggledy-buggledy!” 

My dad shouted my nickname out the window of his battered Peugeot 404.  He had just driven the six hours up from Santa Barbara to the ranch, coming to see his boys and his ex-wife on their family place. 

It’s the summer of 1978.  I’m a self-conscious 11.

I heard one of my cousins laugh at my nickname.

Dad bounded from his car, and swept me up in his arms, kissing my cheek and then my forehead.  I wriggled away, looking at my mother’s sister’s boys, who stood watching from the front porch, bemused.   Their father, an uncle I idolized, shook his sons’ hands and slapped their backs.   He saved his kisses for their sister.

My father had been born into an assimilated Jewish family in Vienna. His father, who died when my own daddy was just 12, was a formal and stern doctor – but nonetheless, when he did express affection, did so with kisses and embraces.   My father, who wasn’t the least stern, carried on this tradition of hugging and kissing his boys.

I loved my father’s kisses.  I just wanted them when no one else was around.

My mother’s side of the family took manners very seriously.  I got my first round of handshake lessons when I was six.  “Don’t squeeze too hard, but don’t offer a limp fish either.”  “Make eye contact.” “Hold the grip for three up and down pumps, no more.”  “See if you can manage a twinkle in your eye so that the person knows you’re happy to see them.”   My grandmother, cousins and uncles offered tips and strategies, and I learned.

By the time I was 11, I also got lessons on how to kiss a woman on the cheek as part of the handshake process. (Lean forward, keep your hand on hers, and let your dry lips lightly brush the right side of her face.  Do not linger.)   Men were expected to kiss most girls and women, but to do so in ways that were more genteel than threatening; the goal was to be chaste, enthusiastic, and brief.   One got very good at it.

Fathers, except for mine, did not kiss their sons.

I confess I remained shy about my father’s kisses for years. That embarrassment didn’t lift until I was 17, and my first girlfriend, April, saw daddy kiss me goodbye.  “I love that he kisses you,” she said, “More men should do that.”   Connie, April’s mother -- whose own parents had emigrated from France and was there to observe this exchange between me and my Dad -- remarked that her own father had always kissed her brother, April’s uncle.  “American men are just so stunted.  You’re lucky to have a European dad.”

My father and I kissed each other for the rest of our lives.  I kissed him goodbye as he died, 14 years ago.

I’ve kissed David every day I’ve been with him since he was born.  I don’t intend to stop.   He’s grown up around Israelis, surrounded by grown men who hug and kiss constantly.   My cousins who were shocked by my father’s demonstrative affection?  Their sons kiss their grandsons.  (Young people still get handshake lessons in the family.  Some traditions endure).

I identify a great deal with Hunter Biden.  I too am a “black sheep,” an addict whose public recklessness humiliated his family.   Though my father did not live to see the very worst of my disgrace, he did visit me in half a dozen rehabs and psych wards.  He did see me go through relapses and divorces.  The further I fell, the more generous and expansive my father’s hugs and kisses became.  No matter what, I was his precious boy.  He showed me that in his words, and in his embraces.   When I saw that now-famous photo of Joe kissing Hunter, it made my heart ache in memory – that was exactly how my daddy held me.

As you may have heard, there’s been genuine distaste for this display of paternal affection by many on the right.  Some of that is a desire to mock Hunter Biden for his myriad shortcomings, but more of it is a desire to paint Joe as somehow not a “fully American man.”   Donald Trump, with his doughy body and his complete lack of military, athletic, or outdoors experience is an odd choice for a right-wing masculine ideal – except that one cannot imagine the president hugging or kissing any of his sons.  (How he touches his daughters is another subject).  If he cannot embody real masculinity in any other way, Trump’s refusal to display genuine affection to any other man signals a particular kind of virtue to a particular kind of voter.  The right-wing attacks on Joe Biden’s kisses are designed to draw this contrast between the candidates, and play on the deep homophobia and rigid machismo of the president’s male base.

In the end, though, I don’t want to play this game of politicizing affection.  I know that there are plenty of Trump voting dads who kiss their sons (I count more than one such man among my friends).  And I do not want to posit the simple idea that physical affection between men is a reliable indicator of a healthy relationship – there are plenty of dysfunctional relationships punctuated by hugs and smooches.  

And yet -- it is so vital for boys to know that women are not the only ones upon whom they can rely for comfort and care.   It is so crucial for my son to know that his “boyness” is in no way contingent on a refusal to express affection.   It is so important that we hold each other.