“My Papa’s Waltz” by Theodore Roethke is a text that has a hidden meaning through a unique story. In said story, there is a very intoxicated dad dancing around his house with his son. The two wreaked havoc upon the house, bumping into and breaking everything in their way, and the dad would not notice. The mom stood and watched in disapproval while her husband danced around with her child. She let them dance away because she felt she could not do anything about the husband’s waltz. The end of the tale gives us a different feeling when it is read. It changes to a positive perspective for the reader. After all the drunken dancing that the child and father did, the child still looks up to his dad.

During the first four lines of the writing, Roethke makes the reader think twice about what he or she just read. Those lines set an odd situation for the whole story. The text goes on to say, “The whisky on your breath / Could make a small boy dizzy; / But I hung on like death: / Such waltzing was not easy” (Roethke 90). The very beginning of the stanza makes the reader think of the father is a raging alcoholic. The father would need to drink a large amount of alcohol for the son to actually smell it off of his breathe. The father was clearly drunk and started to dance with his son around the house even though the son did not want to. When the Roethke says the child hung on like death, it suggests the dancing was quite aggressive (Roethke 90). The fact that the young boy still still fulfills his drunk father’s wishes reiterates the fact that the boy only wants his father’s approval.

Once the dance started, the dad did not set a good example for his son. “We romped until the pans / Slid from the kitchen shelves” (Roethke 90). The dance must have been quite wild to get to the point of pans falling off the shelves. They would have had to bump into everything around the kitchen to knock everything onto the floor. This has to hurt the child if his dad was making him run into everything that was near them. The next two lines highlights another side of the story. The lines talk about how the mother was there watching it happen with a frown on her face that she could not get rid of (Roethke 90). The mother had to stand and watch as her drunk husband danced throughout their house and ran into everything in sight. She could do nothing except let the husband do as he pleases. Her son had to let the dance go on until it was finished.

In the next few lines, the reader learns exactly how old the child is. “The hand that held my wrist / Was battered on one knuckle; / At every step you missed / My right ear scraped a buckle” (Roethke 91). The writer talks about how his ear scraped his father’s buckle. That means that the child only came up to the dad around his waist. The fact that the young boys ear scraped the fathers buckle implies that he is probably around the age of seven or eight. Seven or eight is very young for the child to experience. He is also at the age where is memory is fully developed. He will remember doing this odd dance with his father for the rest of his life. The other part talks about how clumsy the dad is. He must have a lot of missed steps in his drunken dance in order for the son’s ear to scrape his dad’s belt may times. This is obviously painful for the boy. Scraping an ear on a belt buckle would start to hurt after a couple of times. The dad was not a good influence during his dance with his child.

The final paragraph puts a different thought to the reader. The first lines talk about how the father would hit the kid on the head along with the beat, but then the final two lines change the way the reader may look at the whole situation. The final lines go, “Then waltzed me off to bed / Still clinging on your shirt” (Roethke 91). After all that happened, the son still looks up to his dad. Most every son wants to be like their father when they are that age. Son’s look up to their dads even when the father does not look out for it. When his father finally puts the child to bed the son is still clinging onto his shirt. He loves his dad despite his struggle with addiction and poor parenting skills. Every child needs a father figure to look up to, and the father still loves his son. The father son bond helps both the son and father learn about a different part of fife. Even though the father made a mistake with his son and knocked some things off of their place in the house, he would never intentionally try to hurt his son. He loves his son and wants the best for him. In his drunken state, he thought it would be fun for him and his son to dance around the house. The son did not end up liking it very much, but he still loves his dad and looks up to him as though he is a perfect father.

The son in “My Papa’s Waltz” was paraded around his house by his dad although he did not wish to. After all of the dancing, he still loved and looked up to his dad. Fathers and sons have a special connection from birth. Growing up, most everyone wants to be like their dad. Their dad is their hero. Despite the fact that some fathers may unintentionally make mistakes, such as drunkenly dance with their child throughout the house, the children will still look up to them and think that they are the best father. This holds true in most son and dad relationships. One of them may do something that the other does not like, but that does not mean that they do not still care and love each other. Fathers just want the best for their sons. Even if they are drunk, they will still put their child to bed and kiss them goodnight.
