This is the second in a series of blog entries about the songs on my upcoming album “Hello Cruel World”, to be released early 2012. Originally posted at www.gretchenpeters.com/blog.
Most nights I come home from work and I pour a glass of wine
Sometimes it’s three or four before I stop
And Jesse makes a sandwich if I sleep through suppertime
And she leaves me on the couch to sleep it off
I know this woman. I see her in line at the grocery store, pouring coffee at a diner, stopped at a traffic light at rush hour. Part of me pities her, part of me admires her, part of me is her. There but for the grace of god. She’s caught at the crossroads where the struggle to come to terms with one’s mortality meets the urge to slip into unconsciousness. The hell with it; have another cigarette, another glass of wine, another piece of pie. Feeling the weight of her past, and watching it as it bears down on her own child.
But she’s a heroine, not a victim. It takes more guts to survive than to give up. To admit your mistakes, to acknowledge the hard truths and keep going. To persevere, to endure.
Somehow I’ve let myself go gently down the stream
A fine example I have set
Between the working and the livin’
and the ghosts that haunt my dreams
I’ve got five minutes, and I’m gonna smoke this cigarette
To view a clip from the recording of “Five Minutes”: Five Minutes string session with Chris Carmichael and David Henry
“Five Minutes” by Gretchen Peters
© 2010 Circus Girl Music (ASCAP)
from the upcoming album Hello Cruel World
photo by Gretchen Peters (all rights reserved)
