Sunday, March 11, 2012

Song #95. Ain’t It So Nice Outside Today?



"There but for fortune may go you or go I" - Phil Ochs

Ain’t it so nice outside today?
Ain’t it so nice outside today?
There’s so much you want to do.
Ain’t it so nice outside today?

Back's been broke a couple times.
Neck just won’t bend quite right.
Lost his left eye in some bar fight.
Her shoulder’s froze up tight.

They can’t mount a flight of stairs.
Can’t climb out of a chair.
He said, 'My head got busted with a 2 X 4,
And since that day doc, it’s like I got no soul no more.

And it hurts so bad,
And it’s hurt for so damn long now.
The pain won’t ever go away.
But I gotta live another day.'
We all wanna live another day.
'Cause there's just so much we gotta do
And it's so nice outside today'.

Sister been deaf since she was born.
Brother been blind since he was two
From something he got from momma when he got born.
Whatever it was carried momma off too.

The good hand keeps dropping things.
The foot feels like it’s made of wood.
Can’t walk. Can’t talk. Can’t stand. Can’t sit.
There’s blood everytime you take a shit.

And it hurts so bad,
And you ain’t worked for so damn long now.
Boss won't risk your coming back.
And if you don’t work, well you don’t get paid
So you can't live to work another day.
And there’s so much you still can do.
And ain’t it nice outside today?

The nurse, she said good luck
And give you these pills.
But you don't know what they do.
But these pills just don't see you through.
It's like helplessness is just another word for nothing left to lose.

There but for fortune


She said 'Doc, the meth ran out.,
And I crashed real hard
February. The cops found me down
Outside an E/R that'd been shut down.

Seems I’d slept too long
I slept too hard on my right arm.
Doctor said weren’t nothin’ he could do.
He told me he had to cut it off before time I’d come to.'

And the pain so bad sometimes.
And it’s hurt for too damn long now.
I can’t even feed myself.
Didn't Jesus even ask God himself?
Didn't Jesus ask
Why can’t I live another day?
You know that there’s so much I still have to do
And G-d ain't it so nice outside today.
Ain’t it so nice outside today?'

helpless
hopeless
aimless
homeless
pointless
toothless
limbless
useless
faceless
worthless
lifeless
yet it's
don't cry don't cry don't cry

‘Cause there’s still so much that you can do
And ain’t it so nice outside today?


-November 2009

The notes were made on 3/5/2012.  I think there is a great deal here in this one.  Everything in this song happened, again and again, to folks whose greatest aspirations were to be relieved of some of their suffering and to not feel like they were throw away people.  And many would never meet those basic aspirations.  Wrote about the origins of this one in“Charlie Holley and The Cripples” found here.  Definitely got somehelp with this one from my dear brothers Jack Hardy and Andrew Calhoun.  They both said, “It’s go to be IN the song man…”. 

I made a rough home recording of this song linked here (along with many others) needs to be properly recorded as soon as I can get 5K that doesn’t need to pay bills.  Dream on….

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