So I haven't blogged in a while.

What else is new?

Things have been hectic (again) for the last few weeks with regards to both my work and personal life.

I went for a holiday in Cape Town beginning February. We held a funeral for one of my wife's aunts last week. Also, I improved my cycling record on my 35km cycle to the office.

Those were the memorable things that have happened during the past few weeks. It was all the hectic stuff in between that made blogging nearly impossible.

Back on topic though.

I want to throw this out there. Are dads from our generation different than our dads, or our grandfathers?

As a young boy, I looked up to my father for a lot of things. There were many times that I was very intimidated by the wealth of his knowledge or his strength or the way he commanded people around a school yard.

Then there are times when my father really helped me a lot. My father was very good at history and geography. So when I had exams to study for, he was the one who helped me put together my summaries and he was the one who listened to me while I recited my essay questions.

So I am personally grateful to my father for fostering in me a thirst for knowledge and a thirst for the unknown. It's those things that will always make me look up to him.

For other kids there might be different reasons for looking up to your dad.

You might look up to your dad because he was the one who showed you how to kick that rugby ball over the cross-bar from an angle, or your dad was the one who helped you with your math homework.

This turns me to the thinking that our generation might be slightly different.

When I try to picture myself as a future dad there are many things that go through my head. Will I be able to give my child the best?

I think my generation of dads have different skill sets and different interests. It's bound to happen between generations.

There's this scenario playing through my head:
"Dad, I'm stuck at the evil wizard on level 8!". Then I swoop in, push some buttons, kill the evil wizard and hand back the controller triumphantly to my son or daughter.

Obviously, I don't want my kids to turn into gamer junkies. I wouldn't classify myself as a junkie, but a big part of my identity, of who I am, is being a gamer.

So it's definitely not unthinkable that some of that won't influence my children one day, albeit in a controlled, well-parented manner.

Will we become a different type of hero for our kids one day? My dad can beat Mario faster than your dad?

Let's face it, gaming is fast becoming a much bigger industry than Hollywood could ever have imagined. There are already signs of the gaming industry pulling more industry dollars than the big blockbuster movies. Gaming is an entertainment platform and people want to be engaged in a more interactive manner every day. This will be a reaility for our children one day, in a manner that was never a reality for my parents.

I do want my kids to one day experience the same feeling I got when finishing story-based games like Mass Effect or Final Fantasy. When you finish a game not because it had a cool gameplay mechanic, but because you want to know what happens next to the main character. It's like an interactive book that you can't wait to finish reading for the gripping conclusion.

All in a age-restricted manner of course.

Will we become our children's gamer dads? Or am I just rambling away again?