Song #7 - A Southern Day
I watched the new Jason Isbell documentary on HBO this week. I loved it. I admire the way he and his wife, Amanda, balance a life as individual artists and a life together as partners and parents of their young daughter. The scenes in and around the south, and on stage made me miss corners of my life that I didn’t pay close attention to as they were happening.
There is a crystalized wistfulness I have about my experience in the south. I’m just homesick for it sometimes. I used to have a southern accent when I was a kid. Not anymore, although it sometimes shows up when I sing. I don’t know how to feel about that. I’d imagine it’s like being raised knowing two languages, and then growing to only speak one. Do we have any claim to who we were when we were younger if we aren’t that anymore?
As I finished the documentary I got texted a photo of my parents and sister sitting on her front porch in Nashville. I wished I was there. I felt nostalgic for a front porch and for a southern day. My hands found their way to the piano and started playing a riff that sounded like a rocking chair — it comforted me. I recorded the riff and walked down the street to a bar/cafe called Stowaway and wrote this song.
A SOUTHERN DAY
A southern day starts the same way as anywhere else
It’s just when I open my eyes there I feel more like myself
And I know why I wandered away
But I wonder if I can just leave
Tennis court down at the park or the badminton net we set up in our lawn
Always a raquet to find or a band you can start and then be a part of
And I know I know why I came I to New York
But each time I see a front porch
I flash to heat lighting and deep thunderstorms
A sound I don’t feel anymore
I love where I am yes I do though it’s busy and gray
And everyone’s so much to do we don’t smile or wave
And maybe it’s just ‘cause I’m from there I find
A place easy to love, but hard to define
Like I’ve always got Georgia lodged in mind
Like an old cassette tape I rewind
So I just walked down to a bar and I ordered a beer and coffee
‘Cause I did not know what I wanted and there is nobody here who could stop me
And now I’m just gonna live with the ache
My head’s in a vice that’s too weak to break
When I covered my accent with Ivy league paint
I don’t know which color I aint
A southern day starts the same way as anywhere else
It’s just when I open my eyes there I feel more like myself
