As I was getting you ready for bed Tuesday night, you showed me Mommy’s old cell phone with a cracked screen, and said, “Daddy, watch this.”
I immediately knew what it was from the first note of the song: It was the music video for the song “Our House” by Madness.
You were so excited when you learned that I have owned that CD since I was in high school, along with Men at Work; another band whose string of hits you can’t help but love: “Who Can It Be Now?”, “Down Under”, and “Be Good Johnny”.
This week as I’ve worked from the kitchen table (which currently serves as my office), you have been playing a music video playlist from 1983; which happens to be my favorite year of music.
While you play war with your action figures, along barricades you made from Jenga blocks, you have Mommy’s phone propped up playing the soundtrack: “We can dance if we want to…”
Earlier this summer, I challenged myself to write a song about you- specifically, about our relationship as father and daughter.
This past week, I finished writing the song and published it to my YouTube channel.
The concept is this: You are a princess. Since I am your father, that means that I am a king.
Here are the lyrics:
Never thought I’d be the king of anything/Or live in a castle married to a queen/ It never seemed that would be my reality/Then I met a girl who changed everything/Those blue eyes are still a mystery/And when she smiles at me, it’s all that I really need
Well I’m a king if she’s a princess/A slumber party in an Elsa dress/The proudest ever ballerina, the blondest ever senorita/I’m the beast and she’s the beauty/An interruption to my routine/She’s always happy when she sees me/I am royalty, believe me/If she’s a princess, I’m a king
My midlife crisis came a little soon/An existential view with doom and gloom/I was so confused thinking, “What am I here to do?”/Then I met a girl who changed everything/Those blue eyes are still a mystery/And when she smiles at me, it’s all that I really need
I wrote a song a couple of months ago called “These are the Good Ole Days.”
It is a reminder to myself that despite all the craziness in this world that we are living in right now, I have a true blessing with you as my daughter.
I know that years from now, I am going to bitterly miss living in the time I live in now, because I get to be around you everyday.
This 4 year-old version of you especially speaks to me.
You are in some ways the cure I need; the offset to my existential crisis that I have been working through for a couple of years now.
Your sweetness reaches me in a way that I need in my life right now.
It was meant to be that the 4 year-old version of you and the 39 year-old version of me would exist at the exact same time; right when we needed each other the most.
