Easy Dad, Hard Dad

Steve Leveen
2025-06-02T12:31:15-04:00

Every father has to decide about discipline: should I be easy on my kids or tough on them? Should I just enjoy the fun parts of parenting and be soft on discipline? Or should I buckle down on them for their own damn good?

On our spring drive from Florida to Maine, Lori and I (and our dog, Chet) listened to Genius of Place: The Life of Frederick Law Olmsted by Justin Martin. Olmsted’s dad, a successful merchant, was incredibly patient with his son and supportive of him, repeatedly giving Fred money as he tried seafaring, farming, journalism, and publishing, all of which failed to earn the young Olmsted a living. But father and son had a loving and respectful relationship that no doubt contributed to Olmsted´s eventual spectacular success as the pioneer of American landscape architecture. (We thought the biography was captivating, by the way, as was the narration by Richard Ferrone.)

On the other side of the discipline spectrum is the fictional Bull Meecham, the Marine fighter pilot made famous by Pat Conroy in his novel The Great Santini. Based on Conroy’s own father, Bull Meecham’s tough-love fathering descends into cruelty in the basketball scene that earned both Robert Duvall and Michael O´Keefe Oscar nominations, and also an enduring place in my memory almost 50 years after seeing the 1979 movie.

I judge my own fathering to have been more on the Olmsted side. I’m guilty of enjoying my sons a bit too much to be a taskmaster. (Well, except for a couple of teaching moments when, had I failed to deliver some sort of penalty for their misbehavior, I would have been guilty of neglect.) But in most respects, I failed at discipline. I failed to make them learn the piano, even though I had promised our friend Otto Bettmann to do so. I even failed to get them to pick up dog poop, and wound up picking it up myself.

As they were going off to college, I worried I had been too easy on them, so I sat them down for a talk. “Listen,” I said, “I’ve been easy on you guys growing up and you’re about to go off and compete with kids who had fathers who were ballbusters—fathers who demanded performance from their sons, so it’s likely that their sons are going to be fiercer competitors than you.”

I don’t know what my sons made of this lecture, but I felt, having failed as a disciplinarian, I might at least warn my lads that they could find themselves at a disadvantage.

My own father didn’t get the chance to make discipline decisions for my benefit or detriment, since he and my mother divorced when I was six, and my mom took my sister and me to the other side of the country. My father and I didn’t form a relationship until I was a young man and he was middle-aged. But at those stages in our lives, he was all Olmsted, with no Bull Meecham. I will always be grateful for Len Leveen’s late but impactful arrival in my life.

My father passed away in 2018, and now my sons are fathers themselves. Their children are still very young, but from all I observe, both sons are excellent fathers already and will likely do a better job on the discipline question than I did.

But wait, this message is supposed to encourage you to buy a Father’s Day gift from Levenger, so let me share what I’m going to send my sons.

Channel Olmsted’s dad for your Father’s Day gifts

First is the Draftsman Weight. It feels good in your hand, and since parenting is always an unfinished draft, it kind of fits. Besides, it’s useful to have one of these leather weights filled with steel shot on your desk to hold down cables and whatnot.

Second is the Engineer Pen in rollerball. It’s got a manly heft, like something you toss in your toolbox and closes with a decisive snap—like flicking closed a Zippo lighter.

Levenger CEO Margaret Moraskie and staff members picked their own favorites for Father’s Day here. And remember, we offer gift wrapping and free personalized message cards, too.

There: I managed enough discipline to do my sales pitch. I hope you buy something, but more important, I hope you and your family have a marvelous Father’s Day with just as much (or as little) discipline as you like.

As always, thank you for your business at Levenger.

Steve Leveen

Co-Founder