Fathers are in the news lately. Boop boop bee doop (Betty Boop).

Congressman Paul Ryan of Wisconsin said he was willing to run for the vacant Speaker of the House position as long as members understand he is not available 24/7 to do, e.g., fundraising trips across the country, campaign for members in their districts etc. – because he has three kids, and wants to fly home to be with them on weekends. Imagine that.

Also, there was a story about some corporate executive who stepped down because he and his wife had just had their second child. He said he was going to scale back his professional approach; his kids would only be young once. Nice work, Sherlock.

Finally, Vice President Joseph Biden decided not to run for president in 2016 (actually, he was never going to run, having suffered the death of an adult son earlier this year; people don’t recover that quick; it always seemed crystal clear to me; not to others). When a father loses a child, it affects the father. Or should.

News flash. The reason why none of this surprised me, nor caused me to try to “figure out” why these people had taken these decisions, is because I went through all this myself 25 years ago.

I was in the Legislature. When you are in the Legislature at a young age, as I was, elected at age 25, your head gets filled with thoughts of political careers, future offices to run for, etc. I suffered from that syndrome for a while – maybe a week and a half.

Then, in l991, I decided to get married and start having kids. Politics would have to go. No more Maine House of Representatives. No more Scarborough Town Council.

For me, the decision was easy. If you are going to have kids, which I wanted to do, you should be around to raise then, enjoy them and learn from them. It is life. It is how you have a fruitful existence.

So, I announced I was not running for re-election to the Maine Legislature. And soon announced also that I would not be running for re-election to the Scarborough Town Council.

I remember several people were shocked. How could I give up a promising political career just to raise kids?

A few others told me I was crazy.

More simply thought you could do both.

You can’t. It takes a tremendous amount of time to be a father, and do it well. I know. I just finished raising three kids K-12. And, to be a successful father, it is like anything else in life – you have to want to do it, you have to think it is important, and you have to throw yourself into it. Do that, and you will succeed. More important, your kids will succeed.

Isn’t it fascinating that in our society, full-time or near full-time fatherhood is just not something somebody does. Too bad. If there were, our country would be better off.

Dan Warren is a Scarborough trial lawyer. He can be reached either through private Facebook message at Jones & Warren Attorneys at Law page, or by email at jonesandwarren@gmail.com.