Burning Down The House

This blog is my personal playground for writing down all those thoughts that run through my head each day. I can’t leave them pinging around in there. They have to come out or else I would never get anything done. It’s one of the hazards of being a right brained thinker. Or is it left brained. I can never remember. You know, the creative color outside the lines type, not the organized, rule following type of person. Those of you who stop by here regularly (God bless you-your check is in the mail) know my posts run from goofy and juvenile to moody and sad. My brother once chastised me for writing depressing posts for three days in a row. “I can’t help it,” I said. “I write what I feel.” I write with my heart. Some days my heart sings. Other days it weeps.

Words are a part of who I am. I feel compelled to read them, study them and move them around. I love a well turned phrase, especially when it’s in a novel or song lyric. For example, there’s a Trisha Yearwood song that goes, “That’s just a lot of water underneath a bridge I’ve burned.” And a friend of mine whose body was badly battered from his days as a stunt man attributed his injuries to “too many dares and challenges accepted”. Those kinds of phrases stick with me, and like a grain of sand in an oyster grind around in my head until they spur some kind of creative process. Which is what happened this week.

I picked up the new John Mayer CD the other day. I’m in love with John Mayer and his bluesy, soulful guitar. His piercing eyes and wavy brown hair aren’t bad either. I wouldn’t recommend his music for the easily depressed because they’ll have a cigarette in one hand and two drinks in the other within a few bars of songs like Gravity, but I could listen to it all day. There’s a song on there called Slow Dancing in a Burning Room. It’s a break up song, and while I like it, the best part about it to me is the title. That title has been stuck in my head for four days. It will not go away. I love how perfectly it describes demise. Think about it. Visualize it. Slow Dancing in a Burning Room. Six words rich with meaning when placed beside each other.

So, then I read a touching post by my blog buddy Oreneta about her encounter with a stranger whom she suspects was nurturing some destructive thoughts while nursing a bottle. My thoughts about that began colliding with that song title. How fitting a description I thought about self destructive behaviors and things like depression and mental illness. My mind went to work and before long I had some new lyrics. I hope John and his lyricist won’t mind that I played around with their title. It’s not like I’m going to make any money off of it, and he looks like an understanding guy, but something about these words just seem to fit when patched together. Don’t read anything into this song. It’s not about me, but finally my mind is at rest. And sorry bro, if this sounds depressing. It’s simply what was rolling around my cranium and had to come out. How about tomorrow I tell that story about Handy Man singing into a tampon when he was little? That’s a funny one.

SLOW DANCING IN A BURNING ROOM

My friends have gone home
and now we’re alone.
My partner the bottle
won’t seem to let go.

The song is the same.
The steps are too.
We’ll sway out of time
in unsteady shoes.

Chorus: Slow dancing in a burning room
Clinging to hell and building a tomb
A shuffle of pain to a numbing tune
Slow dancing in a burning room

The band keeps playing
while the room burns
but my heart grows colder
with each little turn.

The flames go higher.
I hold on tight
to this darkness I crave
on the edge of light.

Chorus: Slow dancing in a burning room
Clinging to hell and building a tomb
A shuffle of pain to a numbing tune
Slow dancing in a burning room

Bridge: I’m drawn to the heat
‘tho my soul will drown
so I’ll just keep dancing
‘til the walls burn down.

Chorus: Slow dancing in a burning room
Clinging to hell and building a tomb
A shuffle of pain to a numbing tune
Slow dancing in a burning room
Slow dancing in a burning room
Slow dancing in a burning room