Generally speaking, I have declared Fairweather Lewis a politics free zone. However, a couple of days ago I contributed the following to a blog where, I think I may have mentioned, I offer occasional hillbilly political commentary but more often only bullshit. This piece quite nicely combines my passions for music and bullshitting, so I offer it here.

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I decided while I was fixing supper that I needed to listen to music with more--what's the word I want? Something to get my blood pumping. So I chose my favorite Michigander--think that's what they're called--Bob Seger. Loved Bob Seger since high school. My favorites of his output are "The Fire Inside" (with killer piano by Roy Bittan of The E Street Band), "We Got Tonight," "Night Moves," "Like a Rock," and "Against the Wind." All of them pretty much downers about loneliness and aging; I'm not lonely, but I'm feeling my age the past few days.

Tonight, though, the one that gets my attention most is a meditation about life on the road from a musician's point of view: "Turn the Page." Seger originally recorded this, says Wikipedia, on the 1973 album BACK IN '72, but it didn't become a fan favorite until a 1975 live version.

Sometimes my mind makes very peculiar connections. I got to thinking about how this song could also be applied to life on the road for the political candidates.

your thoughts will soon be wandering
The way they always do
When you're ridin' sixteen hours
And there's nothin' much to do
And you don't feel much like ridin',
You just wish the trip was through. . .

Makes me grateful not to be one, as the song goes on:

Well you walk into a restaurant,
Strung out from the road
And you feel the eyes upon you
As you're shakin' off the cold
You pretend it doesn't bother you
But you just want to explode. . .

(insert snarky remark here--especially if you're John McCain of the explosive temper)

Over and over: the same songs for the musician, the same tired rhetoric and speeches for the candidate. I recall the late great country singer George Morgan complaining that singing his greatest hit, "Candy Kisses," was "like going to work." At this stage it's no doubt very much that way for the candidates.

Here I am
On the road again
There I am
Up on the stage
Here I go
Playin' star again
There I go
Turn the page. . .

And they get up and they do it all again tomorrow.

No wonder they make mistakes, misspeak, take bad advice from people who have agendas other than the one the candidates profess.

Tonight, I'm inclined to give the candidates a pass. Their souls must be wailing like the saxophone that opens and closes this song, for time to rest, for time to be alone, for time to THINK.

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My profoundest apologies to Bob Seger for my shameless freeform interpretation of his lyrics; to the candidates for my lack of gravitas; and to my readers for bringing on fits of yawning.

And on that facetious note, fair thee well.