This is a tribute to all fathers and all sons on fathers’ day.
A STORY ‘BOUT SPACE
(For David and Daniel)
Let me tell the story of two bold men, whose names were David and Daniel.
Capturing aliens, bringing ‘em in, these two wrote the manual.
A scientist and a pilot who worked for NASA and the zoo;
They climbed aboard a rocket and together they flew!
CHORUS:
They caught a creature from every planet to put in the national zoo,
And stopped the invasions and infiltrations of alien nations too.
They befriended the tridigitora and many an alien race:
Crater creatures, metal monsters, space dogs, star imposters –
David and Daniel and a story ‘bout space.
Interstellar cockroaches landed in earth’s seas
And secretly built factories to mine our manganese.
But sharks can sense magnetic rays, and helped the boys and Rachel trace
And catch the wicked roaches in their hiding place.
Creatures called Exploitians were sending dinosaurs
Through time and space transporters from tunnels deep on Mars.
But the Roessler gals and Maynard men reversed the transporters, and then
Sent triton tigers back to stop the aliens.
“How good and pleasant it is when brothers live together in unity.” – Psalm 133:1
I wrote this song for my sons about 16 years ago. It is the musical distillation of our bedtime stories. One night when my now-grown sons were children, when we had run out of stories about my wife’s and my lives, the boys wanted to hear stories about their own lives. I started thinking of their futures…and the future. And out of that arose the first “story ‘bout space”: the encounter with a Polysuchus arianis in a cave on Mars. We quickly developed the fictional scenario of David being the head of the national zoo and Daniel a fighter pilot. The two brothers, who in the future remain very close friends, team up to go flying around the solar system and capturing alien animals to go in the zoo, befriending kind alien species, and thwarting multiple attempted invasions by malevolent alien races.
(the wicked Exploitian race, as well as a race of whale-like marine mammals (who ride in space ships filled with water), cockroaches from outer space, mushroom men from space, and others.)
I say these stories are fictional because, of course, I had no idea what they will be doing in the future and whether it will involve space travel, aliens, rockets, zoos or anything at all of the sort. However, built into these stories are things that I believe and expect their future will hold: bravery, daring, service to others, intellectual curiosity and searching for knowledge, development and use of your gifts, brotherhood and friendship (there are fictitious friends, like Harry Jones, who nearly gets eaten by a crater creature and the guy whose mind is taken over by the Kakofloria), creativity, persistence, and mercy (the invasions, once thwarted, turn into opportunities to love your enemies, as commanded by Christ).
These are qualities that I hope and believe will continue to belong to my sons in your future. They certainly do right now! And I hope and expect that David and Daniel will remain fast friends, be blessed, and will be a blessing wherever they are in their world…or out of it!
Note: I tried to give this song a cartoon feel, but what really made it fun was the input from some of my closest pals. My dear friend Jeff Morgan produced the song. Todd London did the percussion and really added the otherworldly sound to it. And my dear friend Joel Anderson helped these creatures come to life with the illustrations! What a blessing these creative and faithful brothers are to me.
Thank you for helping me bless my sons!
Dr. Bill Maynard