Words and Music by Eg

This song was written in Tampa in 2004.  There were two inspirations for this writing of this song.  Frist was the reading of Henri Nouwen’s book The Return of the Prodigal Son and the second was the early stages of my relationship with Marjie.

Nouwen’s book was given to me by my friend Carlos Velazquez, who is a psychologist in San Juan while I was down there doing some professional training for his agency.  It was at a time when I was struggling with the “coming to believe” part of my Second Step.  I devoured this book, mostly with tears in my eyes.  The book articulates a process of spiritual maturation as told through the roles of the characters in the parable of the Prodigal Son.  He says that we must first find ourselves as having “squandered our inheritance and sleeping with the swine” so that we can remember to “crawl our way back home” to find a loving God waiting on us with a fatted calf and open arms.  This image and allegory was the perfect thing for me at the time and helped me to surrender the resistance I was experiencing with coming to believe.

I played the song for the first time to Marjie in March of 2002 at her family’s condo on Siesta Key.   I screwed it up and had to restart it several times but finally got it all out for her.  It was a beautiful moment for me to declare my intention to her that I was going to “walk through my fear” and “learn how to love.”  Ultimately, I failed at this, in part, because I was unwilling to put away the playthings of addiction.  It took a few more years of pain.  I am grateful to report—at the time of this writing—I have been in touch with Marjie and she is sober and we have had some wonderful talks.

The song has undergone many transformations and evolutions.  However, it got pumped full of steroids at County Q.  Specifically by JT’s baritone guitar, which just sets the foundation for the song now, and by Jim’s balls-out harp.  I had someone come up to me the other day and say that she did not like this version of the song, she said it was too folky…too country.  I said, “I appreciate your honesty in sharing that with me…but I love it.”  She smiled.