Roady
06-12-2008, 07:26 AM
From USA Today
Anyway, I was alone in the apartment, absentmindedly playing a lit¬tle samba part on the guitar while I read an article about debutantes. The woman who'd written it was talking about her coming out party, how excited she'd been before it, how ?at she'd felt in the aftermath. The opening line was "I learned the truth at eighteen."
Interesting line, I thought. Might be a song in there somewhere. I hunted around for a melody to go with my samba lick, and tried the line. Nope, it didn't scan. I needed another syllable.
I learned the truth at seventeen, I sang to myself. Something in me clicked, turned over, examined the line, and I got a chill up my spine. I continued to play as I read more of the article. She'd been elected queen of her class, and thought that would solve all her problems. It didn't.
What rhymes with seventeen? I wondered. "Beauty queen," of course. I grabbed pad and pen, then wrote the first four lines:
I learned the truth at seventeen
That love was meant for beauty queens
and high school girls with clear-skinned smiles
who married young, and then, retired
I stared at the paper. How could I write about high school girls, or prom night and homecoming queens? I hadn't had any of those experiences. I thought about that for a while. There were plenty of other school things I had experienced. I knew what it was like to never be asked out on a date. I knew the sinking feeling when everyone else in class came in to find a valentine on their desk, and yours was empty. And I sure as heck knew what it was to feel clumsy and ugly. I could write this song, I was sure of it.
The chords and melody felt familiar from the first. In fact, I got so worried I'd unconsciously lifted someone else's work that I called a friend with an encyclopedic memory for pop music and sang him a verse, anxiously waiting until he said, "Nope. Never heard it before. Pretty, though."
Writing "At Seventeen" took a long time. I went carefully, afraid that if I rushed, it would lose its intensity. I didn't care much whether I told the truth, but I wanted it to be truthful to my own life. As I began toss¬ing in lines like "Those of us with ravaged faces, lacking in the social graces," I became increasingly shy about singing it to anyone. The song was really personal to me, now. I couldn't see facing an audience, sing¬ing that line, then watching them search my face for pimples and scars. I was so short, they might laugh when I came to the line about never being chosen for basketball. At best, I'd look like a fool. At worst, they'd think I was whining.
By the time I finished the second verse two months later, I'd decided I'd never sing it in public. It was just too humiliating. I was sure no one else felt that way. Everyone else was more popular, more socially adept, than I'd ever been. No one would relate to it; they'd probably laugh.
Decision made, I could ?nish the song in peace. But I'd said all the embarrassing things I wanted to say, and the song was still a full verse short.
I let it go for a few weeks, then had an idea. Why not involve the listener? Why not suddenly look at it from a different point of view en¬tirely, and bring them in on it? So I started my last verse by assuming that out there, somewhere, there was at least one other person who'd been through what I'd been through:
To those of us who knew the pain
of valentines that never came
The song ended with:
Repenting other lives unknown
that call and say—Come dance with me
and murmur vague obscenities
at ugly girls like me, at seventeen
Ah. Resolution, finally. I'd called myself "ugly." No one would dare laugh at that. And by using "ugly duckling," I felt I'd given the song some hope, because the ugly duckling always turns into a swan.
There were ? marks in places instead of letters. If I knew it I inserted the letter. I take credit for all errors.
Anyway, I was alone in the apartment, absentmindedly playing a lit¬tle samba part on the guitar while I read an article about debutantes. The woman who'd written it was talking about her coming out party, how excited she'd been before it, how ?at she'd felt in the aftermath. The opening line was "I learned the truth at eighteen."
Interesting line, I thought. Might be a song in there somewhere. I hunted around for a melody to go with my samba lick, and tried the line. Nope, it didn't scan. I needed another syllable.
I learned the truth at seventeen, I sang to myself. Something in me clicked, turned over, examined the line, and I got a chill up my spine. I continued to play as I read more of the article. She'd been elected queen of her class, and thought that would solve all her problems. It didn't.
What rhymes with seventeen? I wondered. "Beauty queen," of course. I grabbed pad and pen, then wrote the first four lines:
I learned the truth at seventeen
That love was meant for beauty queens
and high school girls with clear-skinned smiles
who married young, and then, retired
I stared at the paper. How could I write about high school girls, or prom night and homecoming queens? I hadn't had any of those experiences. I thought about that for a while. There were plenty of other school things I had experienced. I knew what it was like to never be asked out on a date. I knew the sinking feeling when everyone else in class came in to find a valentine on their desk, and yours was empty. And I sure as heck knew what it was to feel clumsy and ugly. I could write this song, I was sure of it.
The chords and melody felt familiar from the first. In fact, I got so worried I'd unconsciously lifted someone else's work that I called a friend with an encyclopedic memory for pop music and sang him a verse, anxiously waiting until he said, "Nope. Never heard it before. Pretty, though."
Writing "At Seventeen" took a long time. I went carefully, afraid that if I rushed, it would lose its intensity. I didn't care much whether I told the truth, but I wanted it to be truthful to my own life. As I began toss¬ing in lines like "Those of us with ravaged faces, lacking in the social graces," I became increasingly shy about singing it to anyone. The song was really personal to me, now. I couldn't see facing an audience, sing¬ing that line, then watching them search my face for pimples and scars. I was so short, they might laugh when I came to the line about never being chosen for basketball. At best, I'd look like a fool. At worst, they'd think I was whining.
By the time I finished the second verse two months later, I'd decided I'd never sing it in public. It was just too humiliating. I was sure no one else felt that way. Everyone else was more popular, more socially adept, than I'd ever been. No one would relate to it; they'd probably laugh.
Decision made, I could ?nish the song in peace. But I'd said all the embarrassing things I wanted to say, and the song was still a full verse short.
I let it go for a few weeks, then had an idea. Why not involve the listener? Why not suddenly look at it from a different point of view en¬tirely, and bring them in on it? So I started my last verse by assuming that out there, somewhere, there was at least one other person who'd been through what I'd been through:
To those of us who knew the pain
of valentines that never came
The song ended with:
Repenting other lives unknown
that call and say—Come dance with me
and murmur vague obscenities
at ugly girls like me, at seventeen
Ah. Resolution, finally. I'd called myself "ugly." No one would dare laugh at that. And by using "ugly duckling," I felt I'd given the song some hope, because the ugly duckling always turns into a swan.
There were ? marks in places instead of letters. If I knew it I inserted the letter. I take credit for all errors.