Town of Faded Signs

[Deleted]

I really don't write that many songs about my own life. I've written a few, but maybe I've just been to too many open mics and heard too many whiny, angst-soaked singer-songwriters sing on and on about their broken heart or some other problem they feel the need to tell us about. All in all, I've had a good (albeit sometimes-bumpy) life, so who wants to hear my problems? Besides, it is more fun to write about others.

This song is an exception. I wrote it last year after some of the thoughts about my brother's death finally digested and settled. For those unfamiliar, my only brother, John, 10 years my senior, died a couple of months before we moved to the Middle East in 2014. He was diagnosed with a particularly virulent and aggressive form of renal cancer; he was dead a month after the diagnosis.

John was a professor emeritus in the Texas A&M system and at a memorial they had for him on the campus in Commerce, I was stunned by the people who came out. He helped so many people in his career, and it was a career spent in the pursuit of truth, knowledge and service. We buried him in a cemetery just west of our hometown of Casey.

Since I don't write very many personal songs, I'm not always sure how much to reveal of my own thoughts and feelings. That's probably a weird thing for a songwriter to say. But, anyway, when my thoughts settled, I sat down and wrote this.

Town of Faded Signs
© 2016 by David Hanners

Head down Central, left on Main
Hang a right and it's straight ahead
What was once a smart two-story stucco
Now sits lonely as an unmade bed

This white house is what you left
More years ago than I care to count
You have returned, my only brother
So much to say but you are not around

Always swore I should get to know you better
Some excuse kept us apart
Blame the years between us, blame the miles
Truth is, it was my fault

Off Route 40 lies a country cemetery
Shaded by persimmon and elm trees
Tombstones adrift on a sea of our ancestry
You are home now, says a sympathetic breeze

To Creation we belong, to Creation we return
Faith that logic undermines
Fare thee well, I will bear my regrets
Down Main Street of this town of faded signs
'Til we meet again, I will bear my regrets
Down Main Street of this town of faded signs

[Lonnie]

Good stuff, David... but you should post these in the Cafe... people rarely visit the songwriting section of the forum.

[Deleted]

Thanks. I'm trying to avoid the Cafe. There are folks there who make my blood pressure go up, and I find it best just to steer clear of unenlightenment.

[Doug]

May 20, 2016 23:32:34 GMT -5 @dhanners55 said:

Thanks. I'm trying to avoid the Cafe. There are folks there who make my blood pressure go up, and I find it best just to steer clear of unenlightenment.

Good stuff.  Glad to see you posting here.  Not being a writer I enjoy what people like you can do things like this stuff with words. 

[Deleted]

May 21, 2016 7:02:09 GMT -5 Doug said:

May 20, 2016 23:32:34 GMT -5 @dhanners55 said:

Thanks. I'm trying to avoid the Cafe. There are folks there who make my blood pressure go up, and I find it best just to steer clear of unenlightenment.

Good stuff.  Glad to see you posting here.  Not being a writer I enjoy what people like you can do things like this stuff with words. 

Thanks. And right back at ya. As I've said before, Doug, you shouldn't discount the talents you bring to the table, and I bet if you sat down to write a verse every other day, you'd have a song in a week. Just tell a story. (And you're not one of those I'm seeking to avoid. I am resigned to the Dougiverse....)