I think it's less about a drug trip or a country girl in the big city, than simply about a creative person who, like all of us at times, sees herself as set apart from the crowds of people around us, drifting off into a dreamland of our own making. Despite the reference to the "lonely one," I see the imagery as largely positive: Annie is a ship, self-sufficient, and enjoying her voyages into the dreamy clouds, which is why she "won't be back for a while." Of course Annie must in part be Ann Wilson herself, the co-author of the song who finds inspiration for her unique art in events and settings which seem mundane and saddening to others. Too many people, instead of making art about the life around us, simply cover their sadness with cheap commercial "art," burying themselves in magazines covered with the posed smiles of someone else. They too are lost in a dreamworld, but someone else's--Annie's dreamworld is hers alone.
I think it's less about a drug trip or a country girl in the big city, than simply about a creative person who, like all of us at times, sees herself as set apart from the crowds of people around us, drifting off into a dreamland of our own making. Despite the reference to the "lonely one," I see the imagery as largely positive: Annie is a ship, self-sufficient, and enjoying her voyages into the dreamy clouds, which is why she "won't be back for a while." Of course Annie must in part be Ann Wilson herself, the co-author of the song who finds inspiration for her unique art in events and settings which seem mundane and saddening to others. Too many people, instead of making art about the life around us, simply cover their sadness with cheap commercial "art," burying themselves in magazines covered with the posed smiles of someone else. They too are lost in a dreamworld, but someone else's--Annie's dreamworld is hers alone.