Drinking has and will always affect people, for better or worse. Alcohol clearly influenced Theodore Roethke's poem "My Papa's Waltz". In his poem there are two main characters along with a largely anonymous third character. Theodore, a teenager, dances with his drunken father while his biological mother watches apprehensively. The characters represent a past memory of Roethke's childhood. In his memory, Roethke's father comes home drunk after a hard day at work. The boy and his father decide to participate in a small dance. As they waltz, the two get a little rowdy with each other. As a result, some people view this poem with a disdainful perception and assume that Theodore wrote the poem with dark thoughts in mind. Rather, despite his father's drunkenness, young Theodore enjoyed every second of it. There is a strong bond between them which, upon careful examination, can be clearly understood in the poem "My Dad's Waltz". In the poem, the act of "waltzing" symbolizes love, although not without some conflict. "Such a waltz was not easy" (Roethke pg 602, 4)....