There was a Tom T. Hall song that was always on the radio when I was a little boy. I’d go on errands with my dad and this song would come on the car radio.
I hadn’t heard the song in ages and started playing it more often after my dad passed away.
The song is called “I Love” and it was released in 1973. The lyrics are basic and the song is only a couple minutes long. It has a country twang to it, but it was on AM radio in Chicago. The big AM stations use to play music before they turned to a more news format in the late 1970’s early 1980’s.
The simplicity of the lyrics and the range of things sung about in such a short song nail Americana just before the Bicentennial.
“I love little baby ducks, old pick-up trucks
Slow movin' trains and rain
I love little country streams, sleep without dreams
Sunday school in May and hay
And I love you too
I love leaves in the wind, pictures of my friends
Birds of the world and squirrels
I love coffee in a cup, little fuzzy pups
Bourbon in a glass and grass
And I love you too
I love honest open smiles, kisses from a child
Tomatoes on the vine and onions
I love winners when they cry, losers when they try
Music when it's good and life
And I love you too.”
My dad didn’t sing very often with the radio, but he did with this song. I‘m not sure what made this song so special to him, but for me it is part of my foundation.
I didn’t know what most of those things were when I was seven, but fifty years later they have grown some meaning in life.
As we get older we pick up things that define our lives. The smell of August rain. Car windows that you had to roll down. Paying for the CTA with a little token. Riding your bike to White Hen and getting a KayO. Getting home from church in the summer and changing out of your church clothes. The smell of new cut grass, the smell of tar in June. Waking up to dead lightning bugs in the mason jar next to your bed.….
… and country songs from your childhood.
It’s about 2:00am and I’ve been up for an hour. It’s the first night in awhile where the windows are closed and the air is on…. I hate that. That reminds me of something else I forgot to list in that last paragraph. Cool summer nights with the breeze across the bed.
Memorial Day weekend has passed. Fourth of July is up next. Summer birthdays, music by the pool, evening cocktails on the balcony, baseball games on the radio and then Labor Day and Don Henley reminiscing how it all ended.
Short week Chalkheads… keep your heads up and on a swivel.
