The only time I become an automotive expert is when my daughter has car trouble

I am not a car guy. Nor am I a fix-it guy.

I'm a guy who drives a car. When it breaks, I call a car guy.

I do, however, stay on top of car maintenance. Which is to say that every few weeks, I check Terry's car, Jack's car and my car to ensure tires are properly inflated, fluids are topped off, no one is due for an oil change, etc.

Beyond that, I'm not the first person you call when your car is making a funny noise.

Unless you're my daughter Melanie, in which case I am absolutely the first person you call when your car is making a funny noise.

In the past few months Mel has called me when her battery died (remedied by an easy jump start that even I could manage) and when her brakes started grinding (I know the sound of worn brake pads when I hear it...we took the car immediately to our mechanic Randy, a true car guy).

This makes me feel good because I'm able to help Mel and because it's very much a dad thing to come to the rescue when your child needs help.

I can, by the way, also replace engine and cabin air filters, and I know how to change a tire. But that's about the extent of my skills.

I could probably change my own oil if someone showed me how, but instead I pay someone to do it for me.

Where I DO excel is in maintaining a file on our computer with maintenance/repair records for each of our cars. It shows the dates and mileage for oil changes, new tire installation, and major procedures like brakes, belts and transmission flushes.

That way I can figure out when a car is really due for periodic maintenance and when the mechanic is just trying to upsell me.

One way or another, my nerdy organizational and computer skills always make up for what I lack in other departments.

The official summertime uniform of the Midwest suburban dad

We never got together and formally ratified this (there are, after all, probably a few million of us), but somehow, collectively, many of us non-coastal, suburb-living dads have made a decision.

We have silently agreed that we're all wearing pretty much the same thing to the graduation parties, barbeques, and other soirees to which we and our wives are invited each year in June, July and August.

The designated uniform is this:

• A solid-colored polo shirt (POTENTIAL FANCY VARIATIONS: A short-sleeve button-down with a semi-daring pattern, or perhaps even a polo with multiple shades...scandalous!)
  
  
• Khaki shorts (POTENTIAL FANCY VARIATIONS: None. You'll wear the khaki shorts and like it, though some of the more daring will perhaps opt for darker shades.)
  
  
• Deck shoes with short (hopefully no more than ankle-length, but preferably no-show) socks (POTENTIAL FANCY VARIATIONS: I guess you can wear some nice sneakers, you slob.)

There are exceptions to this, of course, and quite a few of them. Many more dads have real fashion sense than you might realize, but the rest of us are going with the ensemble described above. It works, it's comfortable, and it requires very little forethought.

I do have a few short-sleeve button-downs I'll break out for especially momentous summertime occasions, but for the most part, it's polo-khakis-boat shoes for me, brother.

Dads, if you and I are at the same grad party, and I see you across the room as I'm filling my plate with potato salad and pulled pork, and you're sporting this dad uniform, I will tip my bottled water at you in a gesture of solidarity.

Then I will walk over, discern whether you are a Tool Guy, a Car Guy, or a Sports Guy, and engage you in relevant small talk until it's time for my wife and I to leave.

This is the suburban dad lifestyle. Embrace it.