this one's from back when cars and songs on the radio still meant something

[and because it came up on shuffle tonight]

it's sometime after midnight on a cold, starlit evening in 1990 and i'm flying westward at 90 mph across the barren new mexico desert in my brother's pristine '72 lincoln mark iv [why? don't ask].

cigarette in my left hand, big gulp between my legs and thoroughly sick of the three eight-track tapes that came with the car, i'm scanning the empty AM dial for something--anything--when the auto-seek locks onto some obscure country station somewhere featuring a song i'd never heard before but which has me from note one.

when the signal suddenly fades just as the guy's bringing it home, i slam on the brakes, slew sideways across three lanes of I-10 to a screeching, smoking halt and reverse at high speed back to where it comes in clear again.

if you're one of those people who has never understood country music, i urge you to listen to this track all the way to the end, because it comes about as close to perfect as any country song ever recorded.

and unlike me, you won't have to sit in the middle of a deserted freeway to do so.