John Prine was known to often say in interviews how he liked old people. He said, "I just like them." He was very close and fond of his grandfather who he wrote about often in his songs.
I think I first heard the "Hello In There" song when I was in 5th grade and it moved me so much. I didn't know why. I only had a grandfather that lived on the other side of the continent and saw him a spattering of times as I grew up. My other grandparents died before me. So the elders I knew were artists I read about, people in the neighborhood, and Becky and Bill who were like my grandparents and were a part of our life until they died. I remember when I heard for the first time John Prine talk about old people, how he liked them and he didn't really know why, but even as a young kid he just thought his grandfather was cool and he liked old people.
"I'm like that," I thought at the age of eleven or so.
It would take me almost half of my life to put it all to use, that love of elders, but here I am.And that song, Hello in There" takes on even more multi layered meanings to me now.
I have always resonated with his music and words. He was a story teller, and story tellers help us share history, feelings, differences-and John Prine had a way of sharing the absurdity and sadness of life, and humor of it too. Life is sort of a big, old beautiful joke and his songs captured that over and over.
Have you ever noticed, when you're feeling real good, there's always a pidgeon, comes and shits on your hood. J.P.
And he kept going forward, after throat cancer, losing part of his lung...he kept sharing stories to our collective benefit.
I knew he wouldn't be with us forever. I knew after 8 days in ICU with his health issues it was not good. I knew like many of the people I've listened to for my entire life he would be gone sooner than later. I scrambled to get each new recording. The words from his latest song on the new album are heartbreaking even in good times, but knowing he died in the hospital without his wife or kids, it is extra sad.
So come on home, come on home, you don't have to be alone. J.P.
Then again, like any song, those words can be looked at in a different light than when he wrote them-songs chronicle our lives and evolve with them. For as he was struggling to survive, maybe it was grandpa and all his loved ones up in Heaven, just like in the song, calling him home....where he is surely fishin'.
