So

I’m disappointed.

Not alarmed. Not angry. Not disenfranchised.

Just disappointed.

Disappointed in the way a father would be when his daughter comes home from her second year in college pregnant.

Pregnant by a guy who, when you get to meet him, only calls your wife Mrs. when he can put the first initial of your last names after the word, and otherwise will only call you and her by your first names. His Camaro is spotless and his mullet immaculate, and he speaks as though he has never heard the words “Please” or “Thank You”, or learned how to give a compliment.

He smacks your daughter on the ass in front of you and doesn’t ask permission before grabbing a second and third beer.

And then the situation goes downhill.

In the ensuing weeks and months your daughter repeatedly calls your wife crying because they have had an argument. After one of those arguments he posted compromising photos of your daughter on the internet. The guy is drinking most of their money away and has quit multiple jobs. He has money coming in, but your daughter isn’t sure from where, and you’re sure that it isn’t legitimate. Any money she brings home gets thrown into their collective pot, and she never sees much from it.

And then one night she comes to your home with marks on her arms, but she threatens to go back to him and lie to the police if you call them. “That’s it!”, you say, and your daughter moves back in permanently with you and your wife. You’d like to “take care” of the problem, now that it has gotten completely out of hand, but you know that your daughter would spill the beans, and taking care of problems like that just aren’t as easy as they used to be.

But it doesn’t stop there.

Now that you have taken away “The Love of His Life”, he retaliates against you. The guy knows you’re a gun owner and manages to get a No Contact order against you and then begins to sue for custody of the future child on those grounds. The parents of this punk are funding that legal excursion, hiring the number one family practice attorney in your state.

All the while, your daughter wants to argue with you and your wife about maybe giving the guy “another try” to “make it all stop”.

And now that you’re just treading water here, your son comes home from college with the news he’ll be a dad in eight months, and the girl could easily be the sister of your daughter’s problem.