Published: June 19, 2009 09:29 am      

Award winner — 06/20/09

Robert Clark meeting difficult challenge: Being a stepfather

In naming Robert Clark the 31st winner of its Father of the Year competition, the Ashland Breakfast Kiwanis Club paid tribute to what can be one of life’s most difficult challenges: That of being a stepfather.

When Clark married his wife Shelly, her children Jacob and Kelly Heishman arrived as part of an instant family for Clark. As scores of other men who became stepfathers when they married can attest, getting used to children in the household can result in a difficult period of adjustment.

In her winning essay, Kelly Heishman admits that she initially was distant to her mother’s new husband and assumed he would eventually leave the family. She now wonders, “Why did I push him away for all these years?”

“Your entire childhood is determined by the man scrambling to put back together the pieces of your heart — a stepfather,” wrote Kelly, who will be a freshman at Paul G. Blazer High School this fall.

Clark was chosen from among the more than 200 elementary and middle school children from the Ashland and Boyd County schools who wrote essays nominating their father figures for Father of the Year. In our book, all of the nominees are winners. For a child to take the time to write an essay nominating someone for Father of the Year clearly means that person is doing something right.

We congratulate Robert Clark — and all the other men nominated for Father of the Year. Cherish what your child has written about you. It’s likely the best Father’s Day gift you will ever receive.