13.03.77 Baltimore, MD, intro to "It's My Life"
‘‘I remember….I remember in the summertime…..this friend of mine used to get his old man’s car….and we used to…at night, used to head down….(?) was about 15 miles…. towards the coast…and we used to…park down the street outside the bars, I remember, ‘cause they wouldn’t let us in ‘cause we weren’t old enough at the time….we used to park that car in the street outside of bars and…..get the bouncers to leave the doors open and we’d listen to the bands….that were coming down out of New York…playing along the coast in the summer….we’d sit there all night just talking, drinking a little bit ….bars closed up….’round 4 o’clock, we’d head back home…..and I remember every night I always (?) when I got out of that car, my old man used to….he used to shut off …every night, 9 o’clock, used to shut off every light in the house…..he’d sit in the kitchen, smoke a cigarette, drink beer ….my mother’d sit in the frontroom with just the T.V. on till she fell asleep, got up to go to work the next morning…. and he’d lock up the frontdoor so that me and my sister used to have to come in ‘round the side….I remember I’d get out of that car and I’d stand there in the driveway….I could look through the screendoor and see the light of his cigarette at the kitchen table…..I’d know that no matter what time I came home, he’d always be sitting there in the dark waiting for me……the longer he’d been sitting there, the worse it always was….I’d slick my hair back real tight, try to…..make it through the kitchen to my room…..’cept he’d wait till I hit the bottom step…..and he’d call my name to come back and sit down with him…..in the dark and he’d be telling me, talking to me….I remember I could always hear his voice….but I could never see his face…..and he’d start off by asking me where I was that night….and how things was going…..then pretty soon….he’d ask me where I was getting my money from or what I thought I was doing with myself …. and how he was just sitting there…..night after night….watching my whole life go to waste in front of him….we’d…..pretty soon we’d end up screaming at each other, my mother’d end up running in from the frontroom pulling him off me, trying to keep us from fighting with each other….and I remember I’d always end up running out the backdoor, running back out into the street, telling him, telling him that someday, someday he was just gonna have to learn to live with it ….. because it was my life and I was gonna do what I wanted to do…..”
Compiled by : Johanna Pirttijärvi