I posted this on Father’s Day almost fifteen years back, but it still holds as true today. This year, even if we’re socially distanced to opposite coasts, I’m sending my father transcontinental love and best wishes. I’ve been glad to celebrate so many Father’s Days with him – and even more glad to have him in my life for all the days in between them – and I look forward to hopefully many, many more years, celebrating live and in person, ahead.

When I was growing up, I loved macaroni and cheese. But, for some reason, I believed the dish was best served for breakfast. The strange preference passed to my younger brother as well, and on most weekends, he and I would put in a request for macaroni brunch.

Complicating matters further, however, I liked Kraft’s Deluxe, which featured a large packet of congealed Velveeta, while my brother remained partial to Kraft Dinner and its powdery (even once cooked) orange ‘cheese’.

So, in an act of kindness and child-humoring that astounds me even to this day, my father (official school lunch and breakfast preparer of our family) would brew up two parallel pots, one of each, for my brother and me.

I think of this each Fathers’ Day, and of the countless other big and small wonderful things my father Andrew did (and still does) for us, and realize that, as far as dads go, my brother and I got it really, really, remarkably good.