Late on a Friday, my husband went up
To the mountains with three friends
They took provisions and bottles of bourbon
To last them all through the weekend
One hundred miles they drove
Just to fish in a stream
And there's so much water, so close to home

When they arrived, it was cold and dark
They set up their camp quickly
Warmed up with whiskey, they walked to the river
Where the water flowed past darkly
In the moonlight they saw the body
Of a girl floating face down
And there's so much water, so close to home

When he holds me now, I'm pretending
I feel like I'm frozen inside
And behind my eyes, my daily disguise
Everything's turning to white

It was too hard to tell how long she'd been dead
The river was that close to freezing
But one thing for sure
The girl hadn't died very well to judge from the bruising
They stood there above her all thinking
The same thoughts at the same time
There's so much water, so close to home

So this is what they did
They carried her downstream from their fishing
Between two smooth rocks, they gently wedged her
After all, it was late, and they'd come a long way
The girl would keep, she was going nowhere
They stayed up there fishing for two days
They reported it on Sunday when they came back down
There's so much water, so close to home

When he holds me now, I'm pretending
Nothing is working inside
And behind my eyes, my daily disguise
Everything's turning to white

The newspapers said that the girl had been strangled
To death and also molested
On the day of the funeral the radio reported
That a young man had been arrested
I went to the service a stranger
I drove past the lake out of town
There's so much water, so close to home

When he holds me now I'm pretending
I feel like I'm frozen inside
And behind my eyes, my daily disguise
Everything's turning to white


Lyrics submitted by thunderball

Everything's Turning to White Lyrics as written by Paul Maurice Kelly

Lyrics © Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC

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Everything's Turning To White song meanings
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  • +1
    General Comment

    This song is from the album 'So much water so close to home' which is the title of the Raymond Carver short story on which it's based. A version of this story also appears in Robert Altman film 'Short Cuts', the various stories in the film being based on Carver's stories. The story is from Carver's collection 'What we talk about when we talk about love'. Highly recommended as Carver was one of American greatest writers, and Paul Kelly songwriting style is quite similar, not just this song.

    Carver's story is told from the wife's pov, and is about her husband and his fishing buddies discovering the body of a girl in the water when they arrive at the fishing hole, but don't report it till the end of the fishing trip. It turns out the girl has been raped and murdered, snd wife is shocked that her husband could have carried on fishing in these circumstances. She starts to question what sort of man her husband is and how well she really knows him if he can act in what seem thinks is such a inhumane and callous manner.

    It sounds like the film Ria talks about is also based on 'So much water.....'.

    BruceBaylisson January 13, 2007   Link

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