"I lived in an attached house. My father used to drive into the wrong driveway all the time. He'd say, Damn it, how do you tell one of these houses from another?"
About this Quote
Paul Simon’s joke lands because it’s domestic and cosmic at the same time: a dad missing his own driveway becomes a miniature parable about postwar sameness. The attached house isn’t just architecture; it’s a built-in metaphor for the mid-century promise of stability that also delivered a kind of copy-paste identity. You can hear the rhythm of a Simon lyric hiding inside the punchline: the ordinary detail, the quick turn, the rueful shrug that lets humor carry the heavier freight.
The father’s profanity is doing real work. “Damn it” isn’t anger at a navigation error so much as irritation at a world that has made recognition harder. When homes are indistinguishable, belonging turns into guesswork. Simon isn’t blaming the father for being inattentive; he’s teasing a culture that prizes uniformity, efficiency, and neighborhood cohesion while quietly eroding the markers that let people feel singular. It’s a suburban version of alienation, delivered as a family anecdote instead of a manifesto.
Context matters: Simon came up writing about characters who feel slightly out of phase with their surroundings, from “The Sound of Silence” to “America.” This quote is the origin story in miniature. The humor keeps it from sounding preachy, but the subtext is pointed: if you can’t tell your own house from the next one, what else have you stopped being able to tell apart - your life, your choices, your self?
The father’s profanity is doing real work. “Damn it” isn’t anger at a navigation error so much as irritation at a world that has made recognition harder. When homes are indistinguishable, belonging turns into guesswork. Simon isn’t blaming the father for being inattentive; he’s teasing a culture that prizes uniformity, efficiency, and neighborhood cohesion while quietly eroding the markers that let people feel singular. It’s a suburban version of alienation, delivered as a family anecdote instead of a manifesto.
Context matters: Simon came up writing about characters who feel slightly out of phase with their surroundings, from “The Sound of Silence” to “America.” This quote is the origin story in miniature. The humor keeps it from sounding preachy, but the subtext is pointed: if you can’t tell your own house from the next one, what else have you stopped being able to tell apart - your life, your choices, your self?
Quote Details
| Topic | Father |
|---|---|
| Source | Help us find the source |
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