By Dave Andrusko
Editor’s note. Father’s Day is this Sunday, June 18. In the days leading up, we’ll post some of the most moving stories about men and abortion often in the context of crisis pregnancies but also just about being a dad.
Who knew—I sure didn’t—that Country Western Music Superstar Kenny Chesney had sung one of the most powerful life-affirming song you’ll ever encounter. And if you are, like me, a dad with a loving wife and three beautiful daughters and one wonderful daughter-in-law, “There goes my life” is almost unbearable poignant.
The song, written by Wendell Mobley and Neil Thrasher, was composed nearly twenty years ago– in 2003. I stumbled across it this weekend.
At first we see a young woman sitting in a car, looking at something we can’t see. Upstairs, her dad, deeply moved, gently pulls back the curtain. Then, as Kenny sings, we see a young man on his high school football team, meeting his girlfriend after practice. She tells him she is pregnant. Understandably—these are teenagers, after all—all he can think of at first is himself.
All he could think about was I’m too young for this.
Got my whole life ahead.
Hell I’m just a kid myself.
How’m I gonna raise one.
She’s crying, he’s crying
All he could see were his dreams goin’ up in smoke.
So much for ditchin’ this town and hangin’ out on the coast.
And then we flash forward a few years and the “mistake” he thought he’d made is now a precious young daughter whose pictures cover up the refrigerator…..
Momma’s waiting to put her to bed. As she drags her teddy bear up the stairs, his daughter smiles back at him. Kenny sings
There goes my life.
There goes my future, my everything.
I love you, daddy good-night.
There goes my life.
The song transitions from the little girl going up the stairs to a young woman coming down the stairs. She has dreams of her own, which, as it happens, is down that long freeway ending in that same West Coast her dad gave up without a moment’s regret.
What we saw her looking at in the first few seconds in now revealed: it’s a picture of her Mom and Dad back when he was playing football.
She smiles as she drives away and her Mom and Dad hug each other as tightly as they did her. And Kenny sings
There goes my life.
There goes my future, my everything.
I love you.
Baby good-bye.
Take 4:55 second and listen to “There Goes My Life”. You’ll be so glad you did.