Father and Son

was always one of my favorite Cat Stevens songs. It still is. If you don't know it and you're interested, check out this video of him performing it a long time ago.



When I was a teenager and even when I was in college, grown-ups always seemed to be telling me what to do and how to live my life, but they never seemed to listen to me. This song struck me then as perfectly encapsulating my frustration while also never portraying the father as evil. It still does.

The years have worn on, as they do, and now I'm the father, and I have a son and a daughter. I tell them things they should do, and I have to believe that sometimes they feel like the young man in this song. All I can say to them--or to any other younger person who has asked me for advice--is that I have never meant to dictate your life. I'll give advice if you ask, and I'll sometimes do it even if you don't ask, but I mean it only as advice.

Perhaps the oddest part of my reaction to this song is that I still identify with the kid. I still feel 16 inside. I suspect I always will.