No. 118 - Ben Rector’s “Love Like This” changed my life

A letter to Cole Rush’s daughter, Faye

Nov 28, 2025

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This Song Changed My Life is an independent music publication featuring weekly essays from people all around the world about the songs that mean the most to them. Created (and illustrated) by Grace Lilly.

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• 3 min read •

We were in Valley Green in Philadelphia, an idyllic forest clearing soundtracked by the gentle burble of Wissahickon Creek and the hubbub of bikers and runners passing by. My buddy Alex married his love, Gab, among friends and in nature. Gab danced to Tom Petty’s “Wildflowers” with her dad. While that song didn’t change my life, it reminded me of the one that did.

Faye. I don’t know where you came from, exactly. Some cells became many, and those many became trillions more. I know when I started loving you, the moment I saw you — a squirmy blur on a fuzzy screen in a dim doctor’s office. That feeling, like a beam of radiant light shining into my chest. And yet, only later did I feel like a father. I sat on the edge of the bed and held you close. You suckled the milk out of a warm bottle, dribbling bits onto your swaddle. Your mom and I cried while Ben Rector’s “Love Like This” played in the dark. Ben Rector gave the shift a melody, described it in words. I wasn’t just a guy with a baby. I was a father, bursting with love for his daughter.

I read books and watched videos that prepared me for you. Don’t worry if your attachment isn’t as strong or as fast as your partner’s, many warned me. My wife carried Faye for nine months. She labored for three days. Fair point, baby books! But they didn’t tell me there’d be an unforgettable moment when Faye, my baby girl, felt so strongly like mine, bonded in a way only parents and their children can be. They didn’t tell me that the moment would summon tears to match the Wissahickon Creek, where I remembered this moment during Gab’s first dance with her father.

I have never known a love like this.

Being your dad is like a rejuvenating spring breeze or the change of the leaves at the first whisper of autumn. It is all of the little things I once missed, now slotted into place as though I were an incomplete puzzle.

It’s the way you’re smiling at me. It’s in the way you hold my hand. It’s the way I’ve watched you change me from a boy into a man.

We listen to “Love Like This” in the twilight hours. You clutch my finger; your hand is only big enough to fit around one of them. You smile and laugh as I smooch your chin. Smiles before bed mean sweet dreams, I’ve learned. There is uplifting beauty in those simple moments, just as there’s an indelible truth to Ben Rector’s simple lyrics. “Love Like This” could be (probably is) a romantic song. But now, a year past that first wrecking-ball fatherhood moment, it is our song. It means Faye and Dada. You seem to feel it, too. You say “dada” and touch my cheek as I rock you to sleep.

Back to Valley Green, soaking up the beautiful moment between father and daughter. I miss you, surely snuggling up with grandma back home, and I think of the moments of change that will come. “Wildflowers” is playing, but all I hear in my head is “Love Like This.” It played as I felt settled into fatherhood. Will it play when I drop you off for school, your hand big enough to grasp two, maybe three, of my fingers? Will it play when you experience your first heartbreak, too big for me to hold you, but never too big to cry on my shoulder? Will it play when we lose someone we love, learning to grieve together? I hope so.

But mostly, I hope that it plays when we dance together. Maybe it will be at your wedding, should you choose to marry. Or perhaps it will be in some living room of our future, sharing a sentimental moment with your old man.

In all those moments and in every moment, I will hold you tight. No matter how many fingers your hand can hold, I’ll squeeze it to remind you of my love for you. This love for you, Faye. Because, truly, I have never known a love like this. ◆

About Cole

Cole Rush is a born-and-raised Chicagoland guy who writes a lot of words. He publishes crossword puzzles on his Substack, The New Dork Times, and covers sci-fi and fantasy books for both The Quill To Live and Reactor Mag.

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