Nothing Like Home Weekend Dad by Haseem Hrab

One Monday morning, my dad moved out of our home and into an apartment.

He said he wouldn't be far, just a bus ride away. Down the street, past the park, and through the tunnel.

The boy slips some photos of himself into his dad's suitcase in case he might forget him during the week. On Tuesdays the boy goes to the grave of his hamster Abraham and remembers that his father cried when they buried him. On Thursday the boy and his mother have tuna sandwiches for dinner. The boy remembers that his dad hates tuna sandwiches.

On Friday his mom packs the boys' suitcase with pajamas, two pairs of jeans, two sweaters, socks and underwear, a toothbrush, and his toy, Wendell. When his dad rings the doorbell, the boy kisses his mom goodbye. They take the bus down the street, past the park, and through the tunnel. It's a long ride. Forty-eight minutes.

My dad says I have two homes now.

This home is home because dad lives here.

It's nothing like home because my mom isn't here."

It's not like home because they have pizza from a box for dinner at a tiny round table. It's nothing like home because his bedroom has only a sleeping bag and one pillow and a street light shines and a car horn's honk comes through the window.

"I'm scared."

On Saturday morning Dad suggests that they do something special, but the boy only wants to do the same things they always do--play cards in the morning and go to the park in the afternoon. After dinner, they go to bed. The boy wonders if his mom went to the pool without him. Sunday is the same, and then it's time to go through the tunnel, past the park, and down the street to the boy's bus stop. The two stand awkwardly on the porch.

"Aren't you coming in, Dad?"

-

"I'm sorry. I don't live here anymore. I wrote you a letter.

Now that I'm not seeing you every day, I'm worried that you might forget that you are always in my heart." his dad says.

That night Dad finds Wendell waiting on his bed. And the next weekend, they take the bus past the tunnel, past the apartment, and to the store to pick out the boy's new bed.

Narrated by the unnamed boy who suddenly finds himself with two homes, Haseem Hrab's Weekend Dad (Groundwood Press, 2020) is a child's-eye view of the end of a marriage, told in straightforward language, portraying both the feelings of loss and the essence of hope, shown sensitively in the poignant line drawings of illustrator Frank Viva, which end with the boy sleeping with his letter and his Dad sleeping with Wendell. In a starred review, Kirkus says, “Viva’s illustrations capture the abundant emotional subtext with simple but effective lines. Unsparingly compassionate; an excellent addition to the collection of books about separation and divorce.”

Hrab is also the author of the the well-reviewed story of being the new kid in the class, Ira Crumb Makes a Pretty Good Friend (Ira Crumb (1)), and Frank Viva is the author-illustrator of Outstanding in the Rain.

(Yawn!) Meet the Dullards by Sara Pennypacker

ONE DAY MR. AND MRS. DULLARD HAD A NASTY SURPRISE.

The Dullards found their children reading--books!

Then their kids, Blanda, Borely, and little Dud, tried to slip outside to play. Next they're going to want to go to school, their parents fretted!

"WHERE DID WE GO WRONG?" SAID MRS. DULLARD.

"PERHAPS IT'S THIS PLACE," SPECULATED MR. DULLARD. "LAST FALL, I REMEMBER, THE LEAVES CHANGED COLOR.

IT'S LIKE A CIRCUS AROUND HERE."

The Dullards decide to try a move to a duller part of town. They repaint the new place, first debating over whether gray walls will remind the kids of paved roads and over-stimulating travel.

THAT COULD MAKE THE KIDS WANT TO GO SOMEWHERE.

Brown paint is nixed for fear it might inspire a desire to try pottery making. The Dullards settle on a mixture of the two--greige, a color guaranteed not remind anyone of anything anybody wants to think about for long.

With the environment suitably quieting, it's time for a little family togetherness time.

Leading the children away from the unplugged television set, the parents try to divert their attention from the freshly painted walls, like with some nice blank sheets of paper. But, alas....

THEY WERE COMPLETELY MESMERIZED.

ALL DAY LONG THE DULLARDS WATCHED THE PAINT DRY.

Parenting is never easy, and in Sara Pennypacker's Meet the Dullards (Balzer + Bray, 2015), Mr. and Mrs. Dullard are in no danger of be accused of encouraging free-range children. Artist Daniel Salmieri is clearly in on satirizing the hover-parent, attiring his dull, duller, dullest family in flat, shapeless gray garb, while using the illustrative device of the window through which the kids are sometimes seen trying to overstimulate themselves by outdoor play, or even worse, escaping to the circus which has just come to town (stealthily advertised in a poster in the background of one page). Kids will get the spoof, and parents will enjoy the satiric twist on protective parenting, but one reviewer takes an ironic stand: "I appreciated that Pennypacker resolves her story without forcing Mr. and Mrs. Dullard to embrace spontaneity and imagination and color and all the other things that movies and books always insist make life worth living. (Those things do make life worth living, but it's tiresome to keep hearing about it.)" says the curmudgeonly New York Times reviewer Bruce Handy.