"Back then, I had been a father for six years, yet I rarely felt comfortable in fatherhood. By the time I had become a father at age 33, most of the men on both sides of my family had passed away (including my own father, who died when I was 15), and most fathers I knew had, like my father, come up when men were expected to be only breadwinners and disciplinarians, rarely immersed in the day-to-day throes of their child's life.

I had to carve out my own definition of a loving, caring daddy, and along the way positive reinforcement was rare at best. Then my daughter Nyaniso, then 6, and I attended the Father's Day service at St. Paul AME Church. During one portion of the program, the pastor asked all the fathers in the church to stand. And for the first time, I stood as a proud father with dozens of other fathers, as the packed church gave us a thunderous ovation.

Then the pastor beckoned children who had come with their fathers to the altar, where they would receive a white rose to give to their dads as a gift. Nyaniso joined hundreds of youngsters who scurried up the aisle.

As they reached for roses, the pastor began extolling our efforts as if he had known us personally: How we were there for the sniffles and scrapes; how we were providers and caregivers; how our children turned to us to fix their broken toys and broken hearts. My daughter extended her rose and gave me a hug, and scores of memories filled my head.

When Nyaniso was 2, she required a biopsy for a cyst (benign) beneath her jawbone. Doctors summoned me just before the procedure, anxious that they couldn't calm her down for the anesthesia. I leaned over her and sang mellodies, the anesthesiologist chimed in, and soon she drifted off with a smile.

When she was 4, she put me in the middle of a dispute she was having with Jessica, her imaginary friend. "She's got nothing to say to me," Nyaniso exclaimed, "and I've got nothing to say to her!" I still have yet to hear Jessica's side of things.

Two years later, friends and babysitters said that she refused to allow them to read to her, because they "didn't do it the way daddy does it," with sound effects and gentle pokes in all her ticklish spots.

I clutched the rose like a keepsake; for me it spoke words I sought to hear from others, yet I needed only to tell myself: As fatherhood goes, I'm doing all right.

Now, as a father of two, I've enjoyed 11 years of Father's Day gifts. Yet one has always stood out, even if I never get another. That's another thing about Father's Day roses: It's a heartstring tugger that keeps on tugging."