Songs for Spike, Part VIII: The Final Installment

Here we go … the final three songs on my compilation CDs for Spike.

30. Watershed by Indigo Girls.

Click here to hear this song.

Up on the watershed
Standing at the fork in the road
You can stand there and agonize
Till your agony’s your heaviest load
You’ll never fly as the crow flies
Get used to a country mile
When you’re learning to face
The path at your pace
Every choice is worth your while

I find this song pretty inspirational. To me, it’s about taking life as it comes, at your own pace.

Here’s a section that I love:

And there’s always retrospect
(when you’re looking back)
To light a clearer path
Every five years or so I look back on my life
And I have a good laugh
You start at the top
Go full circle round
Catch a breeze
Take a spill
But ending up where I started again
Makes me wanna stand still

I do love looking back on my life and seeing how far I’ve come.

After all, five years ago (2002) I was living in Baltimore, having not yet considered the possibility of moving to Los Angeles, dating a series of really wrong men, feeling angry about the way my life was going and wondering if it was going to get any more satisfying. I was literally catching breezes, taking spills, and ending up right where I started again!

If I look five years before that (1997), my life was even MORE different—I was married to my first husband and figuring I’d be spending my life as a housewife in Winchester, Virginia!

Now, my life is so unbelievably different. Thank goodness I can look back and laugh. I promise you, Spike, that there will be days that will be so tough that you’ll think the world is ending. These are the days that will make you laugh later on. I promise. I know you don’t believe me, but it’s true.

31. Wildflowers by Tom Petty. This blog is based on the lyrics to that song. (Click here to hear the song. Don’t ask me about the video! I just found it randomly.)

You belong among the wildflowers
You belong in a boat out at sea
Sail away, kill off the hours
You belong somewhere you feel free

You belong among the wildflowers
You belong in a boat out at sea
You belong with your love on your arm
You belong somewhere you feel free

You belong among the wildflowers
You belong somewhere close to me
Far away from your trouble and worry
You belong somewhere you feel free

Tom Petty said that, when he wrote this song, he just sat down and played it without writing it—the words and music just flowed. That’s what I want for you, Spike, to always be able to run among the wildflowers—somewhere you feel free. Somewhere life can just flow through you and wash over you.

32. You Make Loving Fun by Fleetwood Mac.

Click here to see Fleetwood Mac perform this song. (Note to my niece, Miriam: Yes, there is another woman in Fleetwood Mac besides Stevie Nicks. Her name is Christine McVie. :-))

This song was written for Christine McVie’s boyfriend back in the 1970s, but it could have easily been written for you, Spike.

Sweet wonderful you,
You make me happy with the things you do,
Oh, can it be so,
This feeling follows me wherever I go.

I never did believe in miracles,
But I've a feeling it's time to try.
I never did believe in the ways of magic,
But I'm beginning to wonder why.

I know things won’t always be easy—that there will be days when you can’t stand that I’m your mother and days when I am so frustrated with you that I cry—but I hope I will always remember what a miracle you are to me, baby girl. I love you so much and I haven’t even met you in person yet.