Sometimes Decemberists throw a song at you that you need to just fall into and let consume you. This song sat at the edges of my periphery since I first heard the album, and I needed one of those moments sitting out on a law by my own lake to really let it soak in. Then the interpretation that I embraced tethered to me, tattered me.
In simple terms, this is unknown or unreturned love coming at that time when we still are learning what love really is. The singer (guessing this is a Colin telling his own story here) is regarding a story from his youth. It was a day, a moment, a period of magic. The experiences are real and specific - from the pinch of a cigarette to the sun on the radio. There were happy games like overturning pebbles, playful jokes of ill begotten children on the lawn.They were happy, they were enjoying this lake. Yet he harbored something more.
Whatever he had to wait for, he was ready to wait for her ... until the oceans fell away. He wanted those footprints to be his ghost. The more he tries to define his love, the quicker he was to dismiss it. He wrote it down, threw it all away. "You won't will you, because you never do," judges her reaction before he ever takes action. He wants her to do more - wants her to say things that would lead him to know what is what she will do. He was naive, terminally fae. As confident she seemed to be was as unconfident he was in her.
Yet where my mind churns is what she was - who she was. Did she love him in return, did she just keep him around, did she just want to stay friends. Why didn't she that she will, or will she or won't. What were the things she would do, what she wouldn't do. In the end, he never had a clue. But neither did we.
So in part the beauty of this song is that it is like the singer that addresses the audience. It tatters me. It tethers me to it. It could be a much simpler song, a much simpler story - but to tell the truth I would never have a clue.
Sometimes Decemberists throw a song at you that you need to just fall into and let consume you. This song sat at the edges of my periphery since I first heard the album, and I needed one of those moments sitting out on a law by my own lake to really let it soak in. Then the interpretation that I embraced tethered to me, tattered me.
In simple terms, this is unknown or unreturned love coming at that time when we still are learning what love really is. The singer (guessing this is a Colin telling his own story here) is regarding a story from his youth. It was a day, a moment, a period of magic. The experiences are real and specific - from the pinch of a cigarette to the sun on the radio. There were happy games like overturning pebbles, playful jokes of ill begotten children on the lawn.They were happy, they were enjoying this lake. Yet he harbored something more.
Whatever he had to wait for, he was ready to wait for her ... until the oceans fell away. He wanted those footprints to be his ghost. The more he tries to define his love, the quicker he was to dismiss it. He wrote it down, threw it all away. "You won't will you, because you never do," judges her reaction before he ever takes action. He wants her to do more - wants her to say things that would lead him to know what is what she will do. He was naive, terminally fae. As confident she seemed to be was as unconfident he was in her.
Yet where my mind churns is what she was - who she was. Did she love him in return, did she just keep him around, did she just want to stay friends. Why didn't she that she will, or will she or won't. What were the things she would do, what she wouldn't do. In the end, he never had a clue. But neither did we.
So in part the beauty of this song is that it is like the singer that addresses the audience. It tatters me. It tethers me to it. It could be a much simpler song, a much simpler story - but to tell the truth I would never have a clue.