A portent of change
Lately, I keep noticing this young man. After a week or two I noticed that he was always in the same place at the same time. He sits in the corridor downstairs, reading, quietly, patiently. Sometimes he holds a baby against his shoulder, sometimes he is rocking the pram where his baby is sleeping. Once I saw him with a woman, while she was breastfeeding the baby.

From these observations, I have constructed a story - a story of two young people, students, and their baby. They take turns looking after their child, and when she needs to be at the college for her lectures, but still wishes to breastfeed, he waits for her, reading his textbooks and looking after their child. He isn't there every day, which makes me think that they take turns looking after the baby and studying, sharing the burden equally. This is a new narrative of fatherhood, of partnership and of male/female roles, and I love it. If this is an example of tomorrow's fathers, perhaps something is changing for the better after all.