My Favorite Things

As the wife and I wait for the arrival of our daughter in December, we've been sorting through a lot of boxes so we can more comfortably welcome her into our home. Organizing invariably leads to a reassessment of everything you own. Could a few records or CDs be culled from the herd? Is it really worth hanging on to those baseball cards? And what exactly happened to that Steve Earle concert shirt from the "Copperhead Road" tour?

These questions and many others are still being turned over in my head.

I already wrote about this topic once this week, so I don't necessarily want to tread over the same ground. Let's just say that (to nobody's surprise) I still feel a strong attachment to many of the music-related items I've accumulated over the years.

Needless to say, I'm still interested in keeping the instruments and accessories, the tabs and guitar books and the albums. What I've also found is that I still get sentimental over much of the paper that has been packed away. Ticket stubs evoke images such as that dude who was passed out during most of the rainy Allman Brothers show or the look on Sharon's face while she watched Dave Brubeck perform at the Ryman Auditorium. A postcard brings back the chills I got at Sun Studio as I tried to imagine where Carl Perkins stood when he recorded "Matchbox." News clippings and magazines bring back the sense of loss and devastation I felt upon hearing that we'd lost Roy Orbison and Stevie Ray Vaughan. Needless to say, daddy's little girl is going to have to learn to coexist with this stuff. Because it's not going anywhere.

Sifting through our belongings has brought to mind songs that are about possessions. Here are a few that have made my own sorting a pleasant experience:

"Souvenirs," by John Prine � Most good songs about stuff range from bittersweet to downright sad. Prine's song falls on the morose end of the spectrum:

I hate graveyards and old pawn shops
For the always bring me tears
I can't forget the way the robbed me
Of my childhood souvenirs

And then there's the chorus:

Memories, they can't be boughten
They can't be won at carnivals for free
Well it took me years to get those souvenirs
And I don't know how they slipped away from me

Feeling nostalgic? Incidentally, Steve Goodman and Paul Westerberg (as Grandpaboy) also do this song justice.

Sometimes stuff that isn't even yours elicits the strongest emotions. Such is the case with Jeff Tweedy's breakup song "Box Full of Letters" from Wilco's 1995 debut album "A.M." Two of Tweedy's verses evoke strong images of the breakup:

Got a box full of letters
Think you might like to read
Some things you might like to see
But they're all addressed to me

I got a lot of your records
In a separate stack
Some things that I might like to hear
But I guess I'll give 'em back

I'd be surprised if this song wasn't directed at Jay Farrar, especially given the proximity to the breakup of Uncle Tupelo. If so, I hope Farrar is paying special attention to the "You'll come back again/And I'll still be your friend" line.

Sometimes in the aftermath it's best to laugh to keep from crying. That seems to be The Reverend Horton Heat's philosophy about the division of community property. Call him rockabilly, punkabilly or psychobilly. It's all in good fun when he counts his blessings in "Galaxy 500":

You take the fish
I'll take a bowl
You take the dishes
While you're at it take my soul
But things ain't so bad
Cause I got a Galaxy 500

Guy Clark has been around long enough to know what he likes, and he celebrates those things in "Stuff That Works," from "Dublin Blues":

I got an ol' blue shirt
And it suits me just fine
I like the way it feels
So I wear it all the time
I got an old guitar
It won't ever stay in tune
I like the way it sounds
In a dark and empty room

It's Stuff that works, stuff that holds up
The kind of stuff you don't hang on the wall
Stuff that's real, stuff you feel
The kind of stuff you reach for when you fall.

Clark wrote another song about prized possessions, which I guess makes him something of a patron saint of stuff. He hasn't recorded this one, but fortunately fellow Texan Lyle Lovett has given us a wonderful, poignant reading of "Step Inside This House." I think it best sums up what I've been feeling as I look through the boxes in the basement. I know that you know it, so feel free to sing along:

Step inside this house, girl
I'll sing for you a song
I'll tell you 'bout just where I've been
It shouldn't take too long
I'll show you all the things I own
My treasures, you might say
Couldn't be more than ten dollars worth
But they brighten up my day.