As a Swedish man, I should have been the perfect modern dad. My failure was shameful

I had a beautiful family and all the state support we needed. So why was I using a long-distance ski race as an excuse to let them down? As a child, I had stood at the finish line many times and seen my father's distant, wild look as he crossed the line of the Vasaloppet - a famous annual 90km cross-country ski race through the forests of northern Sweden - his face coated in ice, snot and spit. He never noticed us, no matter how much we screamed and waved. When my father died, I felt it was time...