I swear, I could put together a whole album of songs on the subject of simply going home. Yes, I still owe you the story of that journey, but this little scrap of a song is something I found that serves as a nice opener to that.
Going back where I had been
Tracing the steps I walked back then
Seeing old things with eyes anew
Impatience imploring to soon be through

Wondering why I am drawn back here
To a tired old place I don’t hold dear
Wondering if there’s a thing to learn
At a place I’ve made many turns

[Chorus]
Yet something’s changed–this place, or me?
I left this place to find my dreams
Finding myself in this old town
Finding myself still dragging down

I remember days of bliss
When life was simply that or this
Not having both or none today
But now I cannot live this way

[Chorus]

Passions passed, my sense is gone
I find that I cannot stay long
Nothing to see here, move along
Simply pen this little song

Something’s changed–this I can see
I left this place and lost my dream
I found that self still in this town
And saw that self has now laid down

–

I always like acoustic sets and concerts where songwriters tell the stories of their songs. This has its own weird story. I was reflecting upon the going home thing sometime in my Brit Lit II survey class in the fall. I thought about my trip through Forest, MS as I wrote this. Forest was a place where I had lots of dreams about my future–a future I figured I could find here in Huntsville. I found those dreams, and just as the wisps of dreams slip from your grasp as the morning beckons you to rise and re-enter society, those dreams slipped from my hands.

Of course, the concept of dreams is also interesting: do we make them, or are they given to us? I’d argue both. The dreams I had in Forest were self-supplied, to be sure. That explains their imperfections and improbabilities. The dreams now…are more real, frighteningly so.