For a while during the 1990s Father's Day played second fiddle to Mother's Day. By now we've entered an era of good feelings about Dad. Liberated by generations of people we once called Women's Libbers, we realize that Big Daddy needn't be a patriarchal jerk.

Once again journalist Jake Warga has spliced together slices of life seamlessly, with lots of wisdom yet with the illusion of artless audio verite. This drop-in has already been praised by three reviewers, and it has been licensed by no fewer than seven radio stations from New Hampshire and Austin, Texas to Idaho. It has been aired by at least two stations every year since Warga produced it in 2004. Buoyed by the lilt and loving remarks of his father's voice, as well as the squeaks of Warga, an "overly documented only child" at ages two-and-a-half, four, and seven, from its inception this piece was an instant success. It has gone on to become a kind of radio classic, in part because of such questions young Warga asks his father as "What is poo-poo made of?"

Far be it from me to urge PDs to bend their tired ears yet again. Still, I'm hoping that at least a couple of our overworked, unacknowledged legislators of public radio license this piece in 2008. Listening to Jake Warga's dead father's tape-recorded voice chatting with his young son -- now perhaps as old as his dad when the tapes were made in the 1970s --- may be one sure-fire way of paying homage to Papa on Father's Day.