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closeThe Adventures of a Single Dad
Fatherhood as a solo act proves to be challenging, but possible and fun
Joan Cronk / for The Herald
Neither Jeff Bennett nor Tim Kirkman ever thought that at their ages they would again be living in their family homes with their parents. However, divorce placed them temporarily back. on familiar ground, bringing their children with them.
That hasn’t been all bad though, said Sandy Miller, Kirkman’s mom.
“He is an amazing father. I tell my friends, there are a lot of things that people do wrong in their lives, but I must have done something right because he is calm and kind and tender and sweet to his kids,” she said.
She has enjoyed being close at hand to interact with her grandchildren.
Miller and her husband pick up the slack when Kirkman is working. But for the most part during his visitation with his daughter, Amelia, who is 2 and his son, who is 3, Kirkman is in charge.
Bennett is living on his own now, but for a period of time he was back at home with his mother Katie Bennett and her husband Aaron, who were pleased as punch to help out. Katie Bennett raised two boys and said, “I stood there one morning braiding Polly’s hair and I looked in the mirror and thought, who could ever have predicted that at age 60 I could get to help little girls get ready for school!”
Bennett, a local police officer, has joint custody of his two daughters Emma, 9, and Polly, 6, and as such, he has found himself doing things he couldn’t have imagined.
“I had to learn how to braid hair,” he said. “I can do a mean French braid or a regular braid.”
Bennett is constantly amazed at the drama of little girls and the changing of outfits.
“We call them daily costume changes,” he said. He enjoys watching the feminine side of his girls emerge.
He doesn’t serve on the front lines of parenthood alone, however. His support staff consists of his mother and her husband, his father Bill and his significant other, Mickie.
“Both Mickie and my mom are strong independent women and are showing the girls what strong, independent women can do,” Bennett said.
Weekends consist of camping trips and biking.
“Summertime is travel time,” Bennett said. And travel time means pumping waste vegetable oil he uses as fuel into his converted truck.
“We took a trip to Cannon Beach last summer,” he said, “and the day before we left there we found a fish house and they let us pump the oil out of the back of the restaurant.”
The girls know how to handle the pump and change the filters for the oil. Bennett puts more than 25,000 a year on his truck every year. He said driving down the highway in the truck as it burns the waste vegetable oil means you smell like a barbecue, but with gas prices sky high, using the oil as fuel means he can afford to take weekend trips with his girls.
Bennett and his girls are environmentally aware, too, and try to buy items with no more than five ingredients on the package.
“No high fructose corn syrup,” Bennett said.
They eat a 100-mile diet, meaning they don’t buy food that was created more than 100 miles away. He also brought them to the local caucus so they could begin to learn about the political process.
When Bennett and his ex-wife were divorcing, his mother and her husband decided they would be Switzerland.
“Those girls have been in and out of our house since birth,” she said. “Nobody asks them any questions or drills them for information. They have their own bedroom here, their clothes and the bunk beds and toys.”
Kirkman also has joint custody of his two children. He has been single for about seven months and said his social life has definitely been put on hold. His children stay with him from Thursday at noon until Monday mornings, and he appreciates the support of his mom and dad.
“I have a wonderful mother and father,” he said, “and they are very supportive and a big help.”
He enjoy trips to the ocean with his children and he tries to never miss Sunday church services.
“I am comfortable hauling dollies around too,” said Kirkman. “I have an adorable daughter and a daughter holds a special place in her father’s heart.”
Kirkman, who works as a longshoreman, a tree topper and serves in the National Guard, juggles a lot of balls. Even so, he is trying to master using barrettes and hair ribbons.
Single dads face a host of challenges in raising daughters, but both Kirkman and Bennett prove it is not only possible, but lots of fun.