At my parents' 50th wedding anniversary recently, I told a story of how my dad had helped me through a tough experience years ago, when I was quite young and still in school.  He didn't lecture about it, grow angry about it, or say he was too busy to help.  He didn't tell me how to solve the problem, or offer to fix it himself.  Instead, he listened calmly as I spilled the details.  Then, as we sat there together, in the still of the living room, he said he had faith in how I would handle it.

    Wow. 

    His weren't empty words.  They were a powerful vote of confidence.  

    Today's book choice for Father's Day is filled with many stories like this, stories of how a father has helped, encouraged, guided, or otherwise provided a shoulder to lean on.  The book is Tim Russert's Wisdom of Our Fathers: Lessons and Letters from Daughters and Sons (Random House).  It was first published in 2006 and is now out in paperback, with some new material added.  The stories included here, told by people all over the country who wrote to Russert after they read his first book, Big Russ and Me, about his own dad, are puncuated by the broadcast journalist's commentary and perspective; this is what makes it work.

    "The submissions in this book are overwhelmingly positive," says Russert in his intro.  "I knew early on I wanted to present a favorable picture of fathers—not because all fathers are good, which obviously isn't the case, but because there has been so much talk in recent years about bad parents and dysfunctional families that I was hoping to redress the imbalance."

    He has. 

    Cynics will say this book is too sickly sweet, too puffball, too over-the-top.  It's not.  It's solid.  And instructive.  And worthwhile. 

    "If real estate is about location, location, location," says Russert, "fatherhood is about time, time, time." 

    Virtually every story drives that home in one way or another. 

        (6/13/08:  I'm reeling over the news of this author's untimely passing today, as are many people are across the country. -MM)