I’m in Elche, another Spanish city I’m visiting for the first time — and it’s surprised me. It’s starting to feel like nearly every place in this country gives me a sense of familiarity and comfort. The obvious reasons: the language, the culture. But also, some things — like transport and road etiquette — work remarkably well, even if we’re not talking Scandinavian standards. It took me less than an hour to get from Alicante airport to downtown Elche by public transport (for €1.35). And the palm trees are just stunning.
Of course, speak to any Spaniard and you’ll hear the same complaints you’d get elsewhere: things like education, healthcare, and employment aren’t what they used to be, and there’s always some crisis looming. I’m not going to get into that. I’ll stick to my personal experience.
Now that I think about it, it’s the exact opposite of parenthood: when I get tangled up in my own struggles, I often lose sight of the fact that many of them — while deeply personal — are also universal and systemic.
The daily juggle
The other day, I was talking to my friend Eme — father of twins — about the challenges of recalibrating our relationship and personal lives while making decisions for our kids (school, care, sports, and so on). In other words, how we guide and support them as they grow up — and we grow older.
I told him about the logistical chaos we face when León goes through one of his phases where he wakes up at 6 a.m. or even earlier. He’s clearly still tired, but if he takes a nap during the day — even for 20 minutes — he won’t fall asleep again until midnight. And then he’s exhausted the next day.
“We families are kind of like carbon copies, aren’t we?
Though I often wrestle with the contradiction of having children only to hand them over to someone else to raise, I told Eme that if I want — and need — to work, having access to a daycare is absolutely essential. It’s crucial in nuclear families where there’s no built-in support network. And building one from scratch takes money, mental energy, time, and a good bit of luck.
Eme said to me, “We families are kind of like carbon copies, aren’t we? Sure, we have some minor differences. But everything you just said — that’s more or less what I see happening too.”
Partnership, parenthood, and starting over
Irene and I are in our 40s, raising two kids. After six years of focusing entirely on supporting Lorenzo (who just turned 6 in February) and León (two and a half), it feels like the tectonic plates of our family life are shifting.
Are we going to stay in Greece and send our kids to public school? Now that León’s in daycare, can I get back to work more regularly? Can Irene and I carve out more quality time for just the two of us? What do our future plans look like? Time to reshuffle the deck.
That’s what brought me to Elche. I came for the 3rd International Congress on Masculinities, where I’m presenting two academic papers with Virginia Meneghello. We met back in 2022 when we both took the Diploma on Masculinities and Social Change at the University of Buenos Aires (UBA), and reconnected recently during Damián Huergo’s nonfiction writing workshop on fatherhood. It was thanks to Virginia’s encouragement that we decided to submit two proposals for the congress.
Do padritores exist because society has changed?
One of our papers explores literature and fatherhood. We look at how depictions of fatherhood have evolved in Latin American literature, comparing the authors of the Boom era (García Márquez, Vargas Llosa, Fuentes, Cortázar) with a group of contemporary writers we’ve dubbed padritores — from the Spanish padres escritores (fathers writers), i.e. fathers who write about their children (like Alejandro Zambra, Andrés Neuman, Andrés Burgo, Agustín Valle, Eduardo Halfon, and Juan Sklar).
We ask: Why is it that today, prominent authors are writing about domestic life and their children, while previous generations largely didn’t? Do padritores exist because society has changed — or is it that societal change has made room for padritores, who in turn help shape society by speaking out? If you’re interested in the full paper (in Spanish), feel free to reach out.
The silence of men who want to speak
Our second paper examines the documentary El silencio de los hombres (The Silence of Men) by Argentine director Lucía Lubarsky. In our paper, we explore how the documentary reveals that — even when some men begin to question their gender roles — we still lack spaces for honest introspection and transformation. By analyzing this film, we ask: what could those safe spaces look like, where men can talk openly and deeply?
Initially, Lubarsky thought it would be hard to find men willing to be vulnerable on camera, to reflect on their relationships with fathers, friends, partners, and children, and to reflect on the expectations placed upon them. But to her surprise, she found an urgent need for exactly that kind of space: “It was like this empty territory, and they stepped into it faster and more easily than I ever expected. As if they didn’t know they needed it — until it was there, and they grabbed on like their lives depended on it.”
That insight led us to a central theme of the paper: the issue — both in the documentary and in real life — isn’t that men are incapable of emotional reflection, but that the spaces to do so simply don’t exist. Again, if you’re interested in the paper (in Spanish), let me know!
Beautiful Zambra, Adolescence: a short blanket
As part of our padritores paper, we analyzed Literatura infantil (Children’s Literature), a beautiful book. I deeply related to Alejandro Zambra’s joy and ritual of reading bedtime stories to his son — often accompanied by music. From early on, the Chilean writer would sing Beautiful Boy to his son. And also Two of Us — a song that, while not about parents and children, speaks to love and companionship. That’s why he sings it to his son.
The song brought the film Beautiful Boy to mind — that line: you’ll always be my son. I can’t think of another film that’s hit me that hard — probably because I’m raising two boys who, with the speed life moves, will soon face situations where I’ll have little to no control. “Not too long from now, the limits of fatherhood will become clearer to me — just as they must have once become clear to my own parents,” I wrote two years ago (in Spanish).
The movie also resurfaced in my mind while reading about Adolescence, the series that everyone seems to have watched but I haven’t started yet (nor have I seen Severance). Some of the analyses I have read focus on the absence of parents and adults in the face of the tragedy of the series. (I hope I’m not being too vague — I’m trying to avoid spoilers.)
How are we supposed to help kids if we, the adults, are exhausted, burned out, and totally disconnected?
When I do watch it, I’ll be able to give a more grounded opinion. In the meantime, here’s what I want to say: we, as parents and adults, need to show up more for our kids. We need to make the hard choices and shoulder uncomfortable responsibilities. But to do that, we also need time — and the system isn’t exactly on our side.
A mother and sociologist I spoke with about the show said she couldn’t stop thinking about how much disconnection exists in a world that’s supposedly hyper-connected — and how those voids become dangerously enticing. I told her I’d been turning over a similar thought: how are we supposed to help kids if we, the adults, are exhausted, burned out, and totally disconnected?
There’s a moment in Beautiful Boy when the iconic Lennon song kicks in — the one he wrote for his son, Sean, whom he fathered with Yoko Ono:
Before you cross the street,
Take my hand.
Life is what happens to you
While you’re busy making other plans.
And now, here I am in Elche, without my kids, experiencing something like what Zambra describes: “I should really go up to the little room in the attic where I usually work, but before I do, I make another coffee and sit back down on the sofa to read the mole story again. I don’t quite know why. Well, it’s no mystery: because I miss you, that’s why. It happens a lot. It happens to your mom too — just when we finally have time to work, we’re distracted by your absence.”
