A Place to Call Home…
31 Days of Brannan – Day 8
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Today’s Playlist – Home
This song never fails to tear me up. Whether Jay’s intent was to bring up the visual of runaway or displaced youth, trying like hell to eke out an existence in this sometimes harsh world or not, but that is what came up for me when I first heard it.
It’s something that’s been on my mind as of late. Being an older guy, I’ve been wanting to give back to the younger generations. Displaced youth, especially my glbt brothers and sisters who’ve lost their only home because their families couldn’t see beyond their own short-sighted prejudice against their own flesh, blood and bone and what they had hoped would be unconditional love and support only to be completely abandoned. Their worth plummets and they have to quickly grow up and figure out how to make their own way in the world.
Youth often doesn’t think big picture, or envision the long term effects of recent and often rash decisions. Extrapolation isn’t often in their vernacular – let alone an element of their reasoning/logic.
Fatal habits, broken dreams
Waking up isn’t all it seems
We held on to what we couldn’t see
I carried you, you carried meCamped out in Hollywood roasting letters from your father
We proved survival of the why bother[CHORUS:]
We were young and excited
We were lost and alone
We were free, but misguided
And we had no place to call home
These opening lines took me there. The what if moment of my own life. Now, mind you, I didn’t experience any of that. My parents loved and supported me unconditionally – often even when they didn’t understand me. So I had no such worries that plagued my burgeoning gayboy existence. I was unfettered to explore what being a young gay man meant to me (thankfully beyond the hell that was high school).
But it just as easily could have been my life. Thrown to the wind with no degree of support or knowing I had any place to call home other than the small square foot of space I happened to occupy at any given time.
In the first verse and chorus of Home my takeaway was that this was exactly what could’ve been for me. Jay’s vocals completely support this. There is an understated power lingering as an undercurrent of how Jay slowly reveals the harsh reality he paints. Boys trying to find their own way – finding happiness and pleasures when and where they could to make life at least bearable.
Same old story, different song
Most people get the lyrics wrong
Verse by verse we rode a raging bull
Stomach empty, balls fullLate nights in Hollywood banging guitars and boys
Swingsets and cigarettes were our joys[CHORUS]
We were young and excited
We were lost and alone
We were free, but misguided
And we had no place to call home
I do love the imagery he calls up here in the song – as bittersweet as it is. The manner with which these misguided boys strive to exist and support one another, the freedom they strive to claim for themselves but still harnessed to the harsh reality of what this sort of existence brings is both heart rending as it is poignant.
Then the bridge comes – confirming the pathos that has only up to now bubbling under the surface. Jay’s carefully chosen prose is both impactful as it is cutting. It is the last line that when it comes, and I’ve sung this song in the car with him many times, never fails to bring a tear to my eyes, most go unshed but only because I blinked them all back. But the pain – both implied and imagined with those words – the raw and vulnerable emotions behind them – say everything to me about displaced youth and the inhumanity of it all. I’ve bolded it for easy reference.
Why don’t the Gidoens leave condoms in the drawer?
Bibles don’t save many people anymore
We took up quarters in the bathroom, there were dollars on the floor
I looked at you, you said to me, “Jay, we’re worth more”We were young and excited
We were lost and alone
We were free, but misguided
And we’d found a place to call home
The Always, Then & Now Tour…
Please check out his site with links for his upcoming shows. I am definitely a late comer to the Brannan bandwagon whenever he pulls through my city. But now that I am going this year, I am making it a goal never to miss when he swings through town. I hope you take advantage of the opportunity as well. Also be sure to check out his web store at the following link.
- Jay’s Website – jaybrannan.com
