I try hard not to get boring or repetitive in these daily blog posts, but sometimes I just don't have the time or energy to put something of appropriate diversity. So here's another song – though quite different from yesterday's.
What I'm listening to right now.
Kacey Musgraves, "Merry-Go-Round." I love when some song I don't remember buying or downloading rolls around on my mp3 shuffle and it's like hearing it for the first time, except that at some point I must have chosen it because otherwise it wouldn't end up on my mp3 player on my phone.
This song surprised me. It's just a sort of desolate but well-crafted country song, with simple melodic hooks and clever rhyming. These days, however, I tend to listen to songs while imagining trying to explain them to my students in one of my CC classes, as I often end up having to do with the various bits of American pop that roll along on the "CC" curriculum. In that light, this song qualifies as: too complicated, thematically too adult, and too culturally alien. I could imagine teaching a graduate seminar on American culture to Koreans, using lines from this song as lecture titles on the syllabus.
Lyrics.
If you ain't got two kids by 21,
You're probably gonna die alone.
Least that's what tradition told you.
And it don't matter if you don't believe,
Come Sunday morning, you best be there in the front row like you're supposed to.
Same hurt in every heart.
Same trailer, different park.
Mama's hooked on Mary Kay.
Brother's hooked on Mary Jane.
Daddy's hooked on Mary two doors down.
Mary, Mary quite contrary.
We get bored, so, we get married
Just like dust, we settle in this town.
On this broken merry go 'round and 'round and 'round we go
Where it stops nobody knows and it ain't slowin' down.
This merry go 'round.
We think the first time's good enough.
So, we hold on to high school love.
Sayin' we won't end up like our parents.
Tiny little boxes in a row.
Ain't what you want, it's what you know.
Just happy in the shoes you're wearin'.
Same checks we're always cashin' to buy a little more distraction.
'Cause mama's hooked on Mary Kay.
Brother's hooked on Mary Jane.
Daddy's hooked on Mary two doors down.
Mary, Mary, quite contrary.
We get bored, so, we get married.
Just like dust, we settle in this town.
On this broken merry go 'round and 'round and 'round we go
Where it stops nobody knows and it ain't slowin' down.
This merry go 'round.
Mary, Mary, quite contrary.
We're so bored until we're buried.
Just like dust, we settle in this town.
On this broken merry go 'round.
Merry go 'round.
Jack and Jill went up the hill.
Jack burned out on booze and pills.
And Mary had a little lamb.
Mary just don't give a damn no more.
[daily log: walking, 3.5 km]