1 Meaning
Add Yours
Follow
Share
Q&A
Ten Degrees and Getting Colder Lyrics
(Gordon Lightfoot)
He was standing by the highway
With a sign that just said Mother
When he heard a driver coming
About a half a mile away
So he held the sign up higher
Where no decent soul could miss it
It was ten degrees or colder
Down by Boulder Dam that day
He was raised up in Milwaukee
Though he never was that famous
He was just a road musician
To the taverns he would go
Singing songs about the ramblin'
The lovin' girls and gamblin'
How the world fell on his shoulders
Back in Boulder I don't know
Chorus
And she told him she would take him
For a ride in the morning sun
Back in Boulder he had told her
I don't know when, I've had a better friend
It was out in Arizona
That he heard the lady listening
To each word that he was saying
To each line that he would write
So he sat down at her table
And they talked about the weather
98.6 and rising down by Boulder Dam that night
Chorus
Now he's traded off his Martin
Though his troubles ain't over
His feet are almost frozen and the sun is sinking low
Won't you listen to me brother, if you ever loved your mother
Please pull off on the shoulder, if you're goin' Milwaukee way
It's ten degrees and getting colder down by Boulder Dam today
With a sign that just said Mother
When he heard a driver coming
About a half a mile away
So he held the sign up higher
Where no decent soul could miss it
It was ten degrees or colder
Down by Boulder Dam that day
Though he never was that famous
He was just a road musician
To the taverns he would go
Singing songs about the ramblin'
The lovin' girls and gamblin'
How the world fell on his shoulders
Back in Boulder I don't know
And she told him she would take him
For a ride in the morning sun
Back in Boulder he had told her
I don't know when, I've had a better friend
That he heard the lady listening
To each word that he was saying
To each line that he would write
So he sat down at her table
And they talked about the weather
98.6 and rising down by Boulder Dam that night
Though his troubles ain't over
His feet are almost frozen and the sun is sinking low
Won't you listen to me brother, if you ever loved your mother
Please pull off on the shoulder, if you're goin' Milwaukee way
It's ten degrees and getting colder down by Boulder Dam today
Add your song meanings, interpretations, facts, memories & more to the community.
Someone on the GL version wrote that this song details a down on his luck man near Hoover Dam who went west looking for his life and failed. It details the hopelessness felt has everything passes you by and you're stuck standing still, hopes and dreams deferred and the only thing you feel is the icy chill of failure and neglect.
It seems he had found a woman who was a good match and maybe so when it was warm out at Boulder dam. But at the end, he's sold his Martin guitar and he's stuck out at 10 degrees. The temperature is a metaphor for how life is going.