Words by Madeleine Farr PZ’27

Graphic by Sonia Sidhu PZ ’28

One thing about my dad is that he loves “Fantastic Mr. Fox.”  He quotes it all the time (incorrectly) and sports pairs of socks with foxes on them. It’s sweet and makes sense for a guy like him. He appreciates the quick one-liners peppered throughout the movie, respects the animation’s artistry, and even dresses a bit like Mr. Fox. 

My dad also loves chick flicks, which makes much less sense. “Pitch Perfect” comes to mind first, but also “Clueless,” “Mean Girls,” and so on. Why doesn’t it make much sense? My dad is a rather stoic, straight-edged (and straight), libertarian-leaning 60-year-old white man from England. 

Growing up, we had family dinners every night. My mom, dad, and I would settle around an oak table that I’ve known for far longer than I’ve known some of my closest friends. An only child moment, I know. My mom feels passionately about our dining together under candlelight (three or more taper candles dripping in the table’s center), so from around the ages of about 11 to 17, we had a beautiful ambience to illuminate the political debates that inevitably arose due to the ideological differences within my family. 

As the younger family members tend to be, I was the most left-leaning individual at the table. When I was younger, my mom and I both settled fairly nicely into the center-left box, but now I’ve strayed much further left while she and my dad continue to lie closer to the center. 

My dad enjoys reading books about war. (Don’t they all?) He starts his mornings with the newspaper and a cuppa, and ends them with an IPA and LinkedIn reels. He grew up a farmer, and — after a long stint working in the software industry — returned to farming in Ancramdale, New York, three hours from my childhood home in Brooklyn. Not the most conventional path, but as I’ve learned, he’s not the most conventional guy. 

Maybe I’m too judgemental and close-minded and all the other words I would throw at him over the dinner table when I was a tween, but my dad’s description doesn’t exactly evoke an image of a chick flick lover to me. I’m not sure what I imagine a chick flick lover does look like, but it’s not him. 

This isn’t to say that as I got older I stopped caring about the political and social issues plaguing us, leading to exclusively peaceful discourse with my father. If anything, the opposite has unfolded. However, I’d like to think that I’m more rhetorically skilled nowadays and can avoid just baselessly calling my dad morally bankrupt over social security policy (which he is in fact far from, further from it than most people) and erupting into tears. My dad and I will probably argue until he dies falling from the top of a silo, as families do. 

But despite our differences I have always loved making my dad laugh.

Making my mom laugh is easy. It’s a contagious laugh and quite loud, audible from two floors below her. Making my dad laugh is easy if you know him well enough. Most people don’t, and I’m still learning too. But I’ve had a few success stories by now, almost my 21st year. John Mulaney’s bit on paying for college killed him (Pitzer and my private preparatory high school can also take some credit for that one); Ricky Gervais’ 2020 Golden Globe monologue hit the mark; I’ll fondly recall the first time we watched “Pitch Perfect” together and my dad’s breathlessness at its humor for many years to come. 

I remember when my dad met Fat Amy for the first time or, more accurately, when Fat Amy met Barden Bella leaders Aubrey and Chloe on our TV for the first time. Honestly, Rebel Wilson was an instant favorite the second her Australian accent came out. My dad loves Australians, but Australians aren’t ubiquitous in chick flicks. As I mentioned before, my dad also loved “Clueless” and “Mean Girls.” Funny, independent (at least by the end of the movie), and clever women are ubiquitous in chick flicks. Beyond Fat Amy and the Barden Bellas, Hollywood has gifted my father and I with England’s Bridget Jones, diva Cher Horowitz, beloved lawyer Elle Woods, and more.

I didn’t know this when I began writing this piece, but it actually makes perfect sense that my dad loves chick flicks like “Pitch Perfect.” My dad loves women who are a little bit ridiculous, witty, and loud. He loves women who stick their feet in their mouths sometimes. I think my mother and I would agree that such a description aligns quite nicely with us. My dad would, too, I think. But he’s smarter than that. 

(This was my first creative writing piece in years. How’d I do? Send this to your World War II-obsessed dad and see what he thinks. I’m still deciding whether I’ll send this to mine.)