Shriner's Park Lyrics
Ok let me be the first.
One of ME's most evocative and heart rending songs which, IMO, believe she wrote for every misfit soul who grew up misunderstood and carried their scars for the rest of their lives. This seems like two people who, as kids, were stuck in a similar situation but, it seems, one survived and one went to prison. But the narrator is in a prison as well. He/she remembers the past, wondering what became of the other. But in a larger sense, I think many people with difficult childhoods can identify with this song. I know I do. I love it, but it's always like a punch in the gut. An example of songwriting at it's finest.
Shriner's Park... This is one of my favorite songs of all time and Melissa's best work. I think that it might be about her first love, or first serious love/sexual experience, and the confusion she felt by her sexuality (Slip into the car/trying to make some sense). I haven't read her memoir in a while, but I know she had a pretty significant relationship at 17, referenced also in Fearless Love and Ain't it Heavy. It's possible that the girl she's writing to/about went into a mental hospital or a metaphorical prison in terms of a false lifestyle. I don't get the feeling that either of them are in a physical prison though... At any rate, it's a while later in her life, and Melissa is wondering what ever happened to that girl (Jamie might have been her name in the book, I think that's the one) and where she is now. Reminiscing. I went to a school named Shrine and so looking back at a first love at 17 in Shriner's Park always really hits home.