09 May, 2009

Maybe You'll Show Me How To Drink



Maybe, you'll haul me down to the well

Maybe, you'll show me how  to drink

Oh Lord, I don't know what to say

I'm on my last leg now

Falling to my knees


Maybe you'll show me sadness in the world

Maybe you'll have some light to shine in the dark

Oh Lord give me strength... and need

Maybe you'll guide  this guy through this dream


I didn't learn of you as a child

I didn't get down and pray every night


O Lord, it's a shame

But you've only me to blame

Maybe you'll show me how to drink.


Maybe I'll see anothers point of view

Maybe I'll think of them and not me

Oh Lord give me strength... humility

Maybe my life will finally be free


Maybe, you'll haul me down to the well

Maybe, you'll show me how to drink

Oh Lord, I don't know what to say

I'm on my last leg now

Falling to my knees 


(this is your basically archetypal twentieth century beggardly Christian song.  The funny thing is that I wrote it and sang it from memory quite a few times before someone mentioned to me that I was doing a variation on, "you can lead a horse to water...."  As embarrassing as it is I didn't realize that myself, I took some consolation from the fact that I stole the idea from the saying at the same time.  It fits.  A lot of people think this song is about alcoholism. Most of these people are smart and know a lot.   Well... it's not.  Except that in many ways it is about the struggles I have seen in the world, and my own.  I have had struggles with alcohol.  I am not an alcoholic, but I have had struggles with not drinking too much at times.  And I certainly have had struggles with melancholy and being connected to a community of people who want to serve the world (which I think is the theme of the song.  That said, if you can get the Lord to show you how to drink, then by all means, be advised the Lord has a history of some fairly odd practices where wine is concerned.  So do his followers.  So as Budweiser says, "Drink Responsibly With The Lord."  

Oh yeah, one last thing.  I feel guilty saying I didn't learn of the Lord as a child in the song.  However, that is a horrible reason not to leave the line in.  I after all wrote the song this way.  I may take the lines out in the future for other reasons, like the fact that they are syrupy and embarrassing.  But for the present this is the way I sing the song, and moreover I want to get it out there that my parents, while not Christians explicitly, certainly engaged in behaviors with me that most folks would recognize as a relative of prayer.  And it should also be noted that my parents gave me less to pray about than most others I've seen.

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