The Dallas Morning News said the song had a personal connection for Nelson because his longtime tour manager, David Anderson, revealed his homosexuality to Nelson two years ago.
LB -- It doesn't seem to scan poorly to me. A couple of the words have too many syllables eg 'feminine', but they could be drawled over easy enough to fit into the waltz beat.
Indeed there's an existing Country song to the tune of which these lyrics can be sung. I am forgetting the name of the song and how it goes, but the line that corresponds to "I believe to my heart that inside every man there's the fem'nine" ends "in El Paso" (and is the penultimate line of the verse).
Yeah, I'm on the side of, "it's a great title, with that lovely internal feminine rhyme, are you kidding?"
I spent about half an hour yesterday trying to talk my father, who loves Westerns, into seeing Brokeback. "No way Jose!" was his immediate response. Then I had to listen to long rambling stories about an old friend of his who was a paratrooper in WWII who walked out of a play with a gay paratrooper in it and how that insults the memory of the real--non gay!--camaraderie the paratroopers felt, etc. etc. Then suddenly he had to go to bed.
But I'm determined to win this one. I'll keep y'all posted.
4: I don't know if it's solely an artifact of Western swing, that last beat seems to always get clipped from the question phrase of a verse. At least, according to the three swing songs I just sang under my breath.
What are you hoping your father will get out of Brokeback Mountain? Something along the lines of "Seem like good guys, I guess I can see how that might happen, gee I guess I understand gays now?"
Okay, I'm totally going to lose my job for hanging around this stupid thread, but on Brokeback: The movie has created a massive rift in my family. Better put, it's reopened a very old family wound. Jack's character in the movie was practically modeled after my uncle: rodeo rider whenever he had the money, freelance ranch-hand for the rest of the year.
Uncle Dennis took some pretty savage beatings for being gay, or rather for being suspected of being gay; San Angelo, TX, in the 70s was every bit as bad as the place the movie depicted (and is otherwise similar to the town in the film). One time, in an event that ultimately shattered my mom's family, his own brother joined in (that was Uncle Clifford; you might meet him if you ever find yourself in a Mexican prison, the closest thing he has to a permanent residence). Dennis lived under severe stress and couldn't find very constant ranchwork (I suspect for reasons in other than and in addition to his being gay, but whatever), and he got AIDS early and passed away.
But his longtime partner never caught AIDS, and my whole extended family has never been able to reunite because Dennis's partner calls half of our family, his family. Anyway, long story short, over 10 years the family had come to a sort of fragile peace—we just all sort of play musical chairs when we're all together in San Angelo (where they all still live), the anti-gay conservatives never finding themselves in the same room with the anti-gay conservatives who give Dennis and partner Steve a pass. People see one another, Thanksgiving's a chore, but it worked out.
So it all flew apart over, of all fucking things, a homophobic forward about BB Mountain, to which one of Dennis's own brothers made a nasty allusion to Dennis. I wish I could write the whole fucking lot of them off, and I guess my mom has and so that's that, but you know, I've got little cousins whom I wouldn't mind seeing again.
Exceeding my o-earnestness quotient for the day: the movie, god, is so gorgeous, and it felt good and even rehabilitative to see it, since I was only ever really aware of the painful end of this kind of transaction.
I mean, Armsmasher, I shouldn't call your family members assholes, but how can we live in a society where people think it's cool to attack their dead brother for having been gay?
Mostly I think my dad would like the movie. I think it's a fantastic realization of so many of the things that he (and I) love about "the American West," both myth and reality, and I think that the Ennis character, in particular, is one my father would deeply empathize with.
And yeah, also, his homophobia bugs me and I'd like him to try to get past it. My dad is a remarkably empathetic guy in a lot of ways, and I think his generational fear of teh gays is bad for him. He's come a long way in terms of accepting PK's long hair and nail polish, and I don't see any reason why he can't get over his terror of gayness.
In light of the o-earnestness, I'm going to take a pass on the insanely low hanging fruit at the end of that comment, Smasher.
It's amazing how much homosexuality can drive some people insane. My grandmother didn't speak to my aunt (her own daughter!) for a couple of years because she had a gay friend. When I was down there this past Thanksgiving, he joined us for dinner, so every so often, people get past it.
Well, ugh, to be fair, some of my relatives are perfectly fine people, and some of them I'm discounting for not drawing the same conclusions from the family experience that I have. It's a little tense right now.
Years ago my dad and my brother and I took a long drive to go to a baseball game. Subject turned to homosexuality, don't know how. My dad reminisced--yeah, just like the Little River Band-- about how a number of his friends and colleagues were gay, including some who still exchanged Christmas cards with my parents after many years. Then my dad said "But I wouldn't tell your mother, because I don't want to effect our friendship with X."
I've gone back and forth about whether he was right to just let it go with her like that, or whether he should have taken it on. Just now I think he was probably right.
If you (generic "you" throughout) are moved to say something and you fuck ironic distance and say it, that's earnest. If at no point you're aware that you're fucking ironic distance (or! if what you say comes canned in trite syrup), that's o-earnest. Neither of the latter apply here.
Note that your awareness of effing the eye dee needn't be spelled out all disclaimerwise. According to Bridgeplate rules, at any rate.
It's the same rhythm as the first line of S & G's "America". But that's very complex, each line has a different length, it doesn't really stay in 3s , and unless you actually count or write it out you don't even notice, the melody's so strong.
The first time I ever rode in a car on the New Jersey Turnpike I was in squeals of excitement because of that song.
Tia, me too. I was a junior in high school, and I took a Greyhound by myself to visit a friend in New York. It was my first trip to the city. The bus trip took three days; it was from San Antonio. The whole ride was sort of unforgettable.
What's the frequency, Willie?
The Dallas Morning News said the song had a personal connection for Nelson because his longtime tour manager, David Anderson, revealed his homosexuality to Nelson two years ago.
Not a euphemism.
Posted by Standpipe Bridgeplate | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 1:17 PM
"homosexuality" s/b "emo schlong"
Posted by apostropher | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 1:21 PM
Also: brokeback basketball?.
Posted by tweedledopey | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 1:25 PM
I am betting it's a waltz -- look:
I can hear the melody already.
Posted by Jeremy Osner | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 1:31 PM
Cowboys are frequently secretly fond of each other
"fond of" s/b "fondling".
Posted by Matt F | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 1:33 PM
JO, I almost posted the exact same thing, except you diagrammed it very eloquently.
It also sounds kind of a like a line from a Gilbert and Sullivan operetta, doesn't it?
Posted by Matthew Harvey | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 1:34 PM
Thanks Matthew, that was partially a ploy to see if <pre> tags would work in Unfo. Yes, I could picture this line being written by G & S gone C & W.
Posted by Jeremy Osner | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 1:44 PM
So, a patter song? The quoted lines also seem to scan just about as awkwardly as the title does.
Posted by LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 1:45 PM
LB -- It doesn't seem to scan poorly to me. A couple of the words have too many syllables eg 'feminine', but they could be drawled over easy enough to fit into the waltz beat.
Posted by Jeremy Osner | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 1:48 PM
Indeed there's an existing Country song to the tune of which these lyrics can be sung. I am forgetting the name of the song and how it goes, but the line that corresponds to "I believe to my heart that inside every man there's the fem'nine" ends "in El Paso" (and is the penultimate line of the verse).
Posted by Jeremy Osner | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 1:53 PM
Let's also acknowledge that while this line is awesome...
The cowboy may brag about things that he's done with his woman. But the ones who brag loudest are the ones who are most likely queer.
... it does not rhyme.
Posted by Matthew Harvey | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 1:54 PM
I am the very model of a rugged homosexual
I have a wife but tell the truth my feelings are residual
So when tonight I skip the sheep I tended undetectable
Young Jack and I will fill the tent with tenderness unspeakable
Posted by Standpipe Bridgeplate | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 1:56 PM
... it does not rhyme.
-- because it is the third and fourth lines of a verse whose rhyme scheme is ABAB. I'm pretty sure about this.
Posted by Jeremy Osner | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 1:57 PM
12 is teh fantastic.
Posted by Jeremy Osner | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 1:58 PM
You can listen to a snippet in itunes. it's very... willie.
Posted by tweedledopey | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 1:58 PM
11 and 13: those lines are in the snippet in the itunes music store.
Posted by tweedledopey | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 2:01 PM
TD -- can you post a link? I am curious to hear and find out if I'm right.
Posted by Jeremy Osner | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 2:05 PM
Would this suffice?
Posted by tweedledopey | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 2:08 PM
Osner seems awfully eager to defend this song. Almost like he's too comfortable with his hetero masculinity, IYKWIM.
Posted by Tia | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 2:11 PM
18 -- oughta work out. I'll take a listen when I get home.
Posted by Jeremy Osner | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 2:13 PM
Shakespeare's Sister also quotes that verse, and the rhyme scheme is as Jeremy claims.
Posted by Matthew Harvey | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 2:16 PM
Hrm. I was assuming, country song and all, that the rhyme for 'queer' would be 'beer'.
Posted by LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 2:19 PM
Must we schedule the Willie discussion for a day in which I'm drowning in work?
Posted by Armsmasher | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 2:25 PM
Yeah, I'm on the side of, "it's a great title, with that lovely internal feminine rhyme, are you kidding?"
I spent about half an hour yesterday trying to talk my father, who loves Westerns, into seeing Brokeback. "No way Jose!" was his immediate response. Then I had to listen to long rambling stories about an old friend of his who was a paratrooper in WWII who walked out of a play with a gay paratrooper in it and how that insults the memory of the real--non gay!--camaraderie the paratroopers felt, etc. etc. Then suddenly he had to go to bed.
But I'm determined to win this one. I'll keep y'all posted.
Posted by bitchphd | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 2:25 PM
4: I don't know if it's solely an artifact of Western swing, that last beat seems to always get clipped from the question phrase of a verse. At least, according to the three swing songs I just sang under my breath.
Posted by Armsmasher | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 2:30 PM
What does "the question phrase of a verse" mean?
Posted by Jeremy Osner | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 2:36 PM
#24
What are you hoping your father will get out of Brokeback Mountain? Something along the lines of "Seem like good guys, I guess I can see how that might happen, gee I guess I understand gays now?"
Posted by John Tingley | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 2:56 PM
10: "Down in the West Texas Town of El Paso"? That seems too short.
27: I would bet, "see a movie he'll really enjoy."
Posted by washerdreyer | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 3:03 PM
Okay, I'm totally going to lose my job for hanging around this stupid thread, but on Brokeback: The movie has created a massive rift in my family. Better put, it's reopened a very old family wound. Jack's character in the movie was practically modeled after my uncle: rodeo rider whenever he had the money, freelance ranch-hand for the rest of the year.
Uncle Dennis took some pretty savage beatings for being gay, or rather for being suspected of being gay; San Angelo, TX, in the 70s was every bit as bad as the place the movie depicted (and is otherwise similar to the town in the film). One time, in an event that ultimately shattered my mom's family, his own brother joined in (that was Uncle Clifford; you might meet him if you ever find yourself in a Mexican prison, the closest thing he has to a permanent residence). Dennis lived under severe stress and couldn't find very constant ranchwork (I suspect for reasons in other than and in addition to his being gay, but whatever), and he got AIDS early and passed away.
But his longtime partner never caught AIDS, and my whole extended family has never been able to reunite because Dennis's partner calls half of our family, his family. Anyway, long story short, over 10 years the family had come to a sort of fragile peace—we just all sort of play musical chairs when we're all together in San Angelo (where they all still live), the anti-gay conservatives never finding themselves in the same room with the anti-gay conservatives who give Dennis and partner Steve a pass. People see one another, Thanksgiving's a chore, but it worked out.
So it all flew apart over, of all fucking things, a homophobic forward about BB Mountain, to which one of Dennis's own brothers made a nasty allusion to Dennis. I wish I could write the whole fucking lot of them off, and I guess my mom has and so that's that, but you know, I've got little cousins whom I wouldn't mind seeing again.
Exceeding my o-earnestness quotient for the day: the movie, god, is so gorgeous, and it felt good and even rehabilitative to see it, since I was only ever really aware of the painful end of this kind of transaction.
Posted by Armsmasher | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 3:04 PM
Jesus. How can people be such assholes?
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 3:07 PM
I mean, Armsmasher, I shouldn't call your family members assholes, but how can we live in a society where people think it's cool to attack their dead brother for having been gay?
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 3:11 PM
Mostly I think my dad would like the movie. I think it's a fantastic realization of so many of the things that he (and I) love about "the American West," both myth and reality, and I think that the Ennis character, in particular, is one my father would deeply empathize with.
And yeah, also, his homophobia bugs me and I'd like him to try to get past it. My dad is a remarkably empathetic guy in a lot of ways, and I think his generational fear of teh gays is bad for him. He's come a long way in terms of accepting PK's long hair and nail polish, and I don't see any reason why he can't get over his terror of gayness.
Posted by bitchphd | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 3:11 PM
In light of the o-earnestness, I'm going to take a pass on the insanely low hanging fruit at the end of that comment, Smasher.
It's amazing how much homosexuality can drive some people insane. My grandmother didn't speak to my aunt (her own daughter!) for a couple of years because she had a gay friend. When I was down there this past Thanksgiving, he joined us for dinner, so every so often, people get past it.
Posted by apostropher | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 3:11 PM
I don't think you convert people like that; their children grow up in a different world and think differently.
Posted by John Tingley | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 3:13 PM
It's more work than a movie can do, I'm afraid.
Posted by Armsmasher | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 3:17 PM
If #35 is in part a response to #33, my dad isn't nearly as bad as your relatives, Armsmasher. Thank goodness.
Posted by bitchphd | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 3:19 PM
29 may be earnest, but it's not o-earnest, as far as I can tell.
Posted by Standpipe Bridgeplate | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 3:25 PM
Well, ugh, to be fair, some of my relatives are perfectly fine people, and some of them I'm discounting for not drawing the same conclusions from the family experience that I have. It's a little tense right now.
Posted by Armsmasher | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 3:25 PM
No, SB?
Posted by Armsmasher | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 3:27 PM
Years ago my dad and my brother and I took a long drive to go to a baseball game. Subject turned to homosexuality, don't know how. My dad reminisced--yeah, just like the Little River Band-- about how a number of his friends and colleagues were gay, including some who still exchanged Christmas cards with my parents after many years. Then my dad said "But I wouldn't tell your mother, because I don't want to effect our friendship with X."
I've gone back and forth about whether he was right to just let it go with her like that, or whether he should have taken it on. Just now I think he was probably right.
Posted by John Tingley | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 3:36 PM
No, SB?
No.
If you (generic "you" throughout) are moved to say something and you fuck ironic distance and say it, that's earnest. If at no point you're aware that you're fucking ironic distance (or! if what you say comes canned in trite syrup), that's o-earnest. Neither of the latter apply here.
Note that your awareness of effing the eye dee needn't be spelled out all disclaimerwise. According to Bridgeplate rules, at any rate.
Posted by Standpipe Bridgeplate | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 3:43 PM
Sorry, I just flew in from Pet Peevistan.
Posted by Standpipe Bridgeplate | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 3:47 PM
What if Ironic Distance fed you some 'ludes and you're not quite sure what's happening?
Posted by Tia | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 3:47 PM
The best treatment is prevention. Never let your guard down around Ironic Distance.
Posted by Standpipe Bridgeplate | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 3:49 PM
#40: "affect."
Posted by bitchphd | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 3:49 PM
SB, you're saying it's my responsibility to worry about Ironic Distance? Ironic Distance is everywhere!
Posted by Tia | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 3:50 PM
B, you just gave Tingley a Wolfson, and vice versa.
Posted by Standpipe Bridgeplate | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 3:51 PM
I changed it once than changed it back; could never get the hang of that one.
Posted by Anonymous | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 3:53 PM
#48 was me. How vice versa?
Posted by John Tingley | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 3:56 PM
B, you just gave Tingley a Wolfson, and vice versa
I want to give B a tingley.
Posted by apostropher | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 4:04 PM
Tia, of course it's not. I regret that the easy joke didn't map well onto familiar principles of justice.
Posted by Standpipe Bridgeplate | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 4:11 PM
If Ironic Distance is everywhere what's it distant from?
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 4:14 PM
#49: Wolfson a Tingley.
#50: See, just the fact that you want to gives me a tingley all over.
Posted by bitchphd | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 4:15 PM
Is that song really more awkwardly named than "Mamas, Don't Let your Babies Grow Up to be Cowboys"?
Which by the way is taking on a whole new meaning now that I know Willy thinks cowboys are gay.
Posted by Urple | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 4:25 PM
28 -- It is possible that I am thinking of that song and inserting an extra measure worth of beats into each line.
Posted by Jeremy Osner | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 4:33 PM
Every couple of verses there's an extra beat: "So in anger I/ challenged his right for the love of this maiden...."
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 02-15-06 4:37 PM
It's the same rhythm as the first line of S & G's "America". But that's very complex, each line has a different length, it doesn't really stay in 3s , and unless you actually count or write it out you don't even notice, the melody's so strong.
Posted by dave heasman | Link to this comment | 02-16-06 7:23 AM
[thinks for a moment]... Oh, you mean Simon and Garfunkel, not Sullivan and Gilbert! Ok.
Like "Cowboys are frequently secretly fond of each other,/I've got some real estate here in my bag..."
Posted by Jeremy Osner | Link to this comment | 02-16-06 7:27 AM
Cowboys are frequently secretly fond of each other
We smoked the last one an hour ago.
Posted by apostropher | Link to this comment | 02-16-06 7:42 AM
The first time I ever rode in a car on the New Jersey Turnpike I was in squeals of excitement because of that song.
Posted by Tia | Link to this comment | 02-16-06 7:48 AM
I'm oing to be singing Marty Robbins in my head all day now. Actually, that's pretty great!
Posted by Chopper | Link to this comment | 02-16-06 7:55 AM
"Ennis" I said, as we boarded the Greyhound for Texas,
"Brokeback just seems like a dream to me now..."
It took me four days to hitchhike from Laramie,
I've come to look for some gay cowboys
Posted by Jeremy Osner | Link to this comment | 02-16-06 8:03 AM
(Weak.)
Posted by Jeremy Osner | Link to this comment | 02-16-06 8:05 AM
No, it's cool, especially the way the scansion of "gay cowboys" deflates the melody.
Posted by Matt Weiner | Link to this comment | 02-16-06 8:07 AM
(Thanks.)
Posted by Jeremy Osner | Link to this comment | 02-16-06 8:08 AM
The first time I ever rode in a car on the New Jersey Turnpike I was in squeals of excitement because of that song.
Tia, me too. I was a junior in high school, and I took a Greyhound by myself to visit a friend in New York. It was my first trip to the city. The bus trip took three days; it was from San Antonio. The whole ride was sort of unforgettable.
Posted by Joe Drymala | Link to this comment | 02-16-06 9:36 AM
(Cue Midnight Cowboy theme.)
Posted by mealworm | Link to this comment | 02-18-06 4:44 PM
Alas, in Drymala's case, they weren't raindrops.
Posted by Tia | Link to this comment | 02-18-06 4:46 PM