All The Best Comics Have Daddy Issues #6

 

Daytripper was a near perfect comic, perhaps you’ve heard of it before. The comic was beautiful and haunting and completely direct on an emotional level. It also came about as I was preparing for fatherhood and the final issue shipped only days before I welcomed my boy into the world. Hit the jump to see the impact it had on me.

Daytripper #10 – You’re Now A Father

It was about the last week. Our baby was overdue, tensions were high, anticipation was higher. It was an emotional time in my house because we’d been on orange alert for about a month. We just could not wait for it to happen. But wait we had to. We were getting induced and that’s not something you can do at home.

I don’t care how many websites and books and personal acquaintances say it can be done, there’s no science to it. I did everything, everything. None of it worked.

But I’m not saying it can’t work. I’m just saying there’s no guarantee. That goes for pretty much all of conception, pregnancy, and birth. No person’s one story will necessarily ever be replicated. It’s like telling someone you know how their wedding day or marriage will go, it is different for everyone.

So we waited and I kept my usual schedule. Let the lady sleep in the morning and get up at 5am to write. And read. I picked up my copy of Daytripper #10 and began. It was always going to be sad purely because it was the end of the line. After this issue there would be no more Daytripper and that’s leaving a hole in my life because I’ve loved this series. So I grabbed the comic and immersed myself.

Now, I’m going to try not to spoil too much of the story, you should have read it yourself. In January you can buy the trade paperback and you seriously need to. The book is sublime but at the end of the final issue it hit very close to home.

We see Bras as an old man and he has some interaction with his son. It’s sweet and still real. There’s problems there. The usual problems that affect every familial relationship. Then Bras leaves a letter for his son and it gets highly emotional.

Now, I have to admit, I cried. I wasn’t sobbing, but I was extremely choked up. This comic hit home in the most perfect way. I was emotionally affected.

To put this into context, I rarely cry because of media. In primary school, I cried when I read Charlotte’s Web. Once, while extremely sick in high school and running a fever, I cried during Always. I think it was their use of The Platters, always a quality selection. A few years back I cried at the end of The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, that ending was just gut wrenching. Other than that…I just don’t cry. It doesn’t come naturally. I might choke up mildly, feel the tickle in the throat, but the well is always dry.

But I read a comic and I cried just a little bit. I was about to become a father and this comic hit on that in such a pure and real way. It was perfect.

It was kind of nice to be touched in that way (yes, both Fabio Moon and Gabriel Ba touched me, I’ll make the joke first, ha) and I can now see that being a father has changed the way I see the world. I hate seeing cars speeding because I think about what would happen if their negligence were to impact on my family. I like to see family relationships in media because it makes me reflect on my own family unit now. I can feel this emotional unlocking within me.

I can’t wait to give my son the single issues of Daytripper and see how he likes them. I’ll probably have to wait a while, but eventually I think he’ll dig them quite a bit.

Conclusion

Daytripper is always going to be one of my favourite comics of all time, it’s just pure. But now I’ll have a personal connection as well. It’s always going to remind me of that time just before I became a father and my world improved tenfold. What comic reminds you of some aspect of fatherhood? Is there a comic that represents fatherhood to you? Let me know in the comments.

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