The Songwriter

I used to write songs.

Before I had kids, I would come home after work and play my guitar and make up scenarios in my head to write about. I once wrote a song about an early twentieth century circus performer who was abandoned by all the kids who decided that his act was lame. He was the guy who gets shot out of a cannon. I mean, seriously.

And then I wrote all the typical girl-in-her-room songs, about love and sex and breakups and broken hearts, even though I have never experienced a breakup (thankfully). I wrote songs about my husband, my daughter, my students, and my parents.

Sometimes I get out my song notebook and sing through some of them. Most of them I’ve forgotten. And, pretty much all of them are terrible songs. Should that matter to a girl who just sings them in her room, no audience, no recordings, no witnesses? Probably not. But, for some reason it does.

Maybe someday I’ll get back to it. Sometimes I feel inspired. One thing I haven’t tried is writing songs about potty training or baby vomit. Maybe I should work on that: The Stay-at-Home Mom’s Song Notebook. I can almost hear a chorus in my head: “Don’t hold a baby high in the sky, he’s likely to throw up right in your eye…”

I’ve gotta go. I’ve got songs to write!