Lydia Likes It

Carolina Day

I fell in love with Livingston Taylor in 1970, when I was 17 and he came out with his very first album (pictured here). I loved every song, and learned all the words, and I remember them to this day. Last night, my husband Ted and I went to see Liv -- brother of James and Kate -- in a show at an intimate Boston club. He's 73 now, and has lost most of the hair in this photo, but his voice and guitar skills are pitch perfect. And this album -- yes, album -- his first, is still one I could listen to every day.

Carolina Day is one of my favorite songs on my favorite album. Have a listen, and sing along.

*Carolina Day gonna rise up sometime
Give me good align said a reason and rhyme
Jump and sing all the time
Work at a' easing my mind

Oh, it's a Carolina day
On a plane out of Logan, up pops a slogan
Talkin' only of easy times
Working at a bottle of ripple wine
Breathing that clean fine southern air
And we all start to laugh
And the people start to stare thinking
Them kids are in a funny way
But we're all in need
Lookin' to see the Carolina day

**And Carolina day don't rise in the morning
Don't set in the evenin'
It ain't that way
Look up in the morning
And you got a grin
And you're with a girl
And you want to stay
Then my friend you're in a Carolina day
Oh, oh, it's a Carolina day

Alec and Brent they're lovin' their child
And James is becoming a star
Sister Kate's laughin' all the time
And my brother Hugh's out wreckin' a car
And my mother smiles thinkin' isn't it fine
That the children are home again
And Louis, my best friend falls on by
And we're all together again.

** repeat
*Repeat

Oh, it's a Carolina day
Zippin' on down to the C.C. house
Thought I'd put my father on
Then smokes then booze then tokes then Herc
And my head were dead and gone
And Doctor Schein a lot of money and time
And a few friends stickin' around
While taking care of business I found my Carolina day
Didn't let me down.

Gordon Lightfoot

If you could read my mind, you'd know how much I miss Canadian singer-songwriter Gordon Lightfoot. His "best of" album, Gord's Gold (pictured above), contains almost all of my favorites from the 1960s and 1970s, with one exception that came out a few years later, in 1976. The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald tells the true story of a shipwreck in Lake Superior -- a kind of documentary song, unlike any other that comes to mind. 

If I Were a Carpenter

 

In high school, I got my first -- my only -- acoustic guitar. I taught myself to play, and honestly, I never got very good, but I had loads of fun imagining myself a wandering hippie minstrel. One of the first songs I learned, If I Were a Carpenter, was written by Tim Hardin, who performed it live at Woodstock in 1969. Bobby Darin recorded it first, in 1966, and though his version was a commercial success, I've always loved the simplicity of Tim Hardin's own very first recording of it. An Earworm Award winner, if ever there was one. Here are the lyrics, in case you'd like to sing along.

 

If I were a carpenter
And you were a lady,
Would you marry me anyway?
Would you have my baby?

 

If a tinker were my trade
Would you still find me,
Carrying the pots I made,
Following behind me?

 

Save my love for sorrow,

Save my love for lonely.

I've given you my tomorrow,

Love me only.

 

If I worked my hands in wood,
Would you still love me?
Answer me babe, "Yes I would,
I'll put you above me."

 

If I were a miller
At a mill wheel grinding,
Would you miss your color box,
And your soft shoe shining?

 

Save my love through loneliness,
Save my love for sorrow,
I've given you my onliness,
Come give your tomorrow.

 

If I were a carpenter
And you were a lady,
Would you marry me anyway?
Would you have my baby?