I’m deeply honored to serve again as a keynote speaker at the National At-Home Dad Network’s annual convention: HomeDadCon.
It will be an interactive keynote full of moments for members to share their own stories alongside mine as we talk about the magical parts of childhood.
The keynote presentation takes place on Friday, September 22, 2023 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
The keynote description follows along with the associated Speaker Bio:
Appreciating the Poetry and Whimsy of At-Home-Dad Life
Jon had Garfield. Charlie Brown had Snoopy. Calvin had Hobbes.
Chris Gaffney has wanted a comic sidekick for his entire life; it took becoming a stay-at-home dad to finally get one – and now he’s got two.
During this interactive keynote address, humorist and renowned public speaker Chris Gaffney reveals how his love for poetry and whimsy guides his cartoon-character-like kids (4 year-old girl, 2-year-old boy) through the Hundred Acre Wood portion of life.
And, how he copes with being the only participant who knows, as Christopher Robin knew, that even enchanted moments eventually pass.
Come prepared to share your two-minute story for an hour of bonding over tales of magic times, epic adventures, imaginary friends, or cartoonish shenanigans.
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Chris Gaffney has been an At-Home Dad for four years (4-year-old daughter, 2-year-old son) and created the website www.ctdads.com, which promotes monthly meet-ups for Connecticut stay-at-home dads. These dinners were co-founded with fellow NAHDN Member Mark Longbrake after returning from HomeDadCon 2022 where Chris gave a keynote address on authentic storytelling.
Chris is currently workshopping a book-in-progress titled Baby Bump: Poems and Stories for Expectant Parents that encourages dads to start reading to their kids at the earliest possible moment, which for his family was the 15th week of pregnancy when fetuses can first hear sounds from outside the womb. Excerpts may be found on the People and Their Poems Podcast.
Many of Chris’ poetry performances have been widely praised, while others resulted in his self-assigned nickname as, “The Bad Boy of Connecticut Poetry” (after an OB-GYN’s spontaneous praise caused him to go long and get the hook).
Chris won the National Society of Newspaper Columnist’s award for best on-line humor column in 2019 as well as numerous public speaking and storytelling awards. His poems have been published in the CT Bards Poetry Review, Southwestern Poetry Review, and Rhyme & Punishment.
Chris is a non-practicing licensed attorney with a Juris Doctorate from UCONN School of Law and a BA in Writing with a Concentration in Political Rhetoric from Ithaca College. He resides in Wolcott, Connecticut with his two children and his wife Jenny. His work can be found at www.uncommondiscourse.com.
