This past Sunday, I celebrated Father’s Day a week early with my dad, and thanked him for being present in my life. Sadly, so many children grow up without their fathers, and their absence is devastating. “Father of Mine” by Everclear is a first person account of the damage inflicted on a child whose “daddy gave me a name, then he walked away.”
Singer Art Alexakis was six years old when his parents divorced. His mother raised him, and he rarely saw his father. He was old enough to remember his father being there as he recalls:
“Take me back to the day
Yeah, when I was still your golden boy
Back before you went away
I remember blue skies, walking the block
I loved it when you held me high, I loved to hear you talk
You would take me to the movie
You would take me to the beach
Take me to a place inside that is so hard to reach”
The song begins with the traumatic moment when he was abandoned.
“You know I just closed my eyes
My whole world disappeared”
In the second verse, Alexakis delivers a scathing rebuke:
“Father of mine
Tell me, where did you go?
Yeah, you had the world inside your hand
But you did not seem to know
Father of mine
Tell me, what do you see?
When you look back at your wasted life
And you don't see me”
He goes on to describe how hard it was for him to be without his protector:
“I was ten years old doin' all that I could
Wasn't easy for me to be a scared white boy in a black neighborhood”
The ways his father attempted to be a part of his life were grossly insufficient.
“Sometimes you would send me a birthday card with a five dollar bill
Yeah, I never understood you then and I guess I never will”
The third and final verse hits hardest, as Alexakis bares his soul, describing the damage done:
“I will never be safe
I will never be sane
I will always be weird inside
I will always be lame”
Yet, through the pain he has experienced, he has learned for himself what it truly means to be a father. It means being present to protect and guide your child through the years as they grow and face challenges. It means being someone they know will always love them.
“Now I'm a grown man
With a child of my own
And I swear, I'm not gonna let her know
All the pain I have known”
This is what truly makes “Father of Mine” so meaningful. Alexakis could sit with his sorrow and anger and lash out at the world, but he fights back against the evil he endured with a dedication to do what is good out of love for his own child. He desires to do what is right and by expressing this in song, encourages others who have similarly suffered to devote themselves to the responsibility to love and care for their children.
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