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"I call my stepfather, Jim, &amp;quot;the Buddha in New Balances.&amp;quot; He&amp;#x27;s just that chill. He also, after 19 years of being with my mom, still grabs her butt in public. Slightly controversial as she&amp;#x27;s nearing 70. Jim, my mom, and me last weekend. How cute are they? Full disclosure: My mother isn&amp;#x27;t exactly easy to put up with. This is not news to anyone who knows her. I grew up with a lot of fighting in the house and many times I would intervene to tell my mom to just &amp;quot;let it go.&amp;quot; Don&amp;#x27;t get me wrong, she and my father loved each other dearly, but both of their personalities were so fiery no one wanted to back down. Jim, on the other hand, is not one for an argument. My brother and sister and I are convinced he has permanent earplugs we don&amp;#x27;t know about. He&amp;#x27;s also a Renaissance man. He was drafted to the NFL but chose to go to the Yale Divinity School in lieu of destroying his already injured knee. He&amp;#x27;s written several philosophy books and spent 30 years as a professor of religion at NYU. He&amp;#x27;s walked across Spain, can read several languages, and now he spends his time on his novel, his garden and making art. I remember once pulling up in his driveway and seeing my mom&amp;#x27;s initials spelled out in the stacked wood. It was remarkably romantic and original. He loves my mom. And he&amp;#x27;s an expert at tuning her out. I wasn&amp;#x27;t always that keen on Jim. I was 15 when my mom met my soon to be step-dad. It wasn&amp;#x27;t long enough (in my teenage petulant opinion) after my dad died and I wasn&amp;#x27;t psyched about my mom &amp;quot;replacing&amp;quot; my dad. The first night I met him, he spent the night with my mom in my parents&amp;#x27; bed. Being the ass that I was, I crept into my mom&amp;#x27;s bedroom before they came up and left one of my favorite pictures of my dad (the one with a smile on his face and his arms outstretched like he was flying) on the pillow. Unfortunately (or fortunately depending on how you look at it), it didn&amp;#x27;t have the effect I wanted. They walked into the bedroom and thought it was the most hilarious and adorable thing they had ever seen. What&amp;#x27;s crazy to think about is that I&amp;#x27;ve now had my stepfather in my life longer than my dad ever was. I still think about my dad a lot, but mostly I think about how lucky my mom is to have loved two men and had them love her back&amp;amp;#8212;in spite of her dirty clothes, her failure to censor and her nickname, Donna Margarita. (Mom loves her tequila). I hope to never know what it&amp;#x27;s like to lose my husband early on in life, but knowing that there&amp;#x27;s always the chance to love again is one of the most beautiful and affirming lessons I&amp;#x27;ve learned. Happy Father&amp;#x27;s Day to my two dads. I love you both. Who will you be celebrating this Father&amp;#x27;s Day? And who here has a step-dad? Was it hard for you to accept him? I want to know all about your dads! Parental lessons: * 6 Awesome Things My Dad Taught Me About Love * The Weirdest Things Our Dads Did Because They Were Uncomfortable Talking About * Do Your Parents Keep an Eye On Your Boyfriend? Turns Out My Dad is Watching J! "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.glamour.com/sex-love-life/blogs/smitten/2012/06/an-ode-to-my-stepfather-and-ho>