Friday, March 22, 2013

Lyrical Context and Toddler Heartbreak

Today the kids and I were listening to some tunes - just a mix of songs from my iphone that have appropriate lyrics, because Leo is really starting to pay attention to the words of songs these days - when "Me Love" by Sean Kingston came on.  It's the one with the chorus that goes, "Oh oh oh oh oh ooh, Why'd you have to go-oh, Away from home, Me love."

Leo was into the song and was jamming along.  I could tell that he was also listening closely to the lyrics as he danced.  In case you aren't familiar, here are some excerpts:

I feel like I'm drowning in the ocean
Somebody come and take me away

Now I'm sittin in a chair with no one here
And I'm feelin all alone -all alone
Thinkin to myself
why my baby up and gone -up and gone
It's like I'm missin her and I know she's missin me- missin me
Towards the end, he breaks it down with a refrain of: 
Why you leave me, wh-why you leave me
Baby tell me, ba-baby tell me
Why you leave me, wh-why you leave me
Why you leave me
It's during this repeated "Why you leave me?" part that Leo stops dancing, looks at me and asks: "Is someone going to work in this song?"

Oh, my sweet innocent boy.  I know we all take art - and especially music - and apply it to my own lives, our own heartbreak.  Oh, but to have him listen to a song lamenting the distance and absence of a loved one - to point of feeling like drowning - and have him draw the parallel to his dad going to work. It's too much.  I nearly melted into a puddle right there.  I hope this is worst heartbreak he ever has to endure.  

Here is a snapshot from the other morning right after jb informed him that it was, in fact, a work day.  He kept repeating, "No, it's a vacation day!"


My poor boy.  And poor jb.  I know it breaks her heart every morning.  Now with Zoe beginning to add her babble of "dadadadada" to the chorus it will be even harder to walk out the door.  Hopefully jb can keep in mind that they are usually fine 10 minutes later and hold onto how lucky we all are to have so much love between us.   And who knows, perhaps one day Leo will be able to channel all this sorrow into an album.

3 comments:

  1. the sweetest... I too wish we could all be together all the time and do 'life' as it suited our schedules. Maybe this group of toddlers will not only become awesome musicians- but they'll be able to reshape their world so we don't have to be so far away from each other 5 days out of the week.

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  2. This broke my heart... I love that leo is such a caring and loving boy!

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  3. I know how that feels. Every time I get home from work, Peyton just runs to the door and squeals. It's a good feeling, but it makes me sad that she had to miss me so much! It's pretty awesome your kiddo picked up on the sadness of the song and related to it!

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