James E. Akenson
There’s bound to be some good scientific research. It could be psychological research. It could be biological research. It’s also biochemical research. I just don’t have time to read it all. It could explain why a song gets in my head, won’t leave, and leads me to other songs.
Who or what is the culprit, you say. It’s a Kathy Mattea song that has stayed in my brain for several days. I’ve always like it, but it came back into my mind of late and won’t go away.
What’s the Kathy Mattea song that has such a hold on me, you say? It’s Eighteen Wheels and a Dozen Roses. Not only that, but Eighteen Wheels and a Dozen Roses triggered thoughts about two other Kathy Mattea songs. So now it’s a troika, a triad, a trifecta. One thing leads to another. That’s why I’ve also been thinking about Comes From The Heart and Life As We Knew It.
First things first. Why would Eighteen Wheels and a Dozen Roses stick in my brain. First of all, I like the melody. It’s easy to follow. A good music theory expert could explain that it follows a melodic structure that is common in our culture. That wouldn’t explain the psychology or biology of why it sticks in my brain, but it’s helpful.
I doubt though that the melody by itself is the key. The words, the lyrics, of Eighteen Wheels and a Dozen Roses tells an interesting story about late life events. Yes, I’m getting older and closer to Charley’s life change, but I liked the song more than thirty years ago.
Yes. It’s easy to follow. “Charley’s got a good life and Charley’s got a good wife” rhymes and deals with typical relationships. But the story is indeed good. Charley is on his last four day run driving up and down the interstate. Retirement is at hand. A life change looms ahead. “Spending the rest of his life with the one that he loves” sounds like an ideal ending as they strengthen their relationship.
It’s easy to be caught up in a believable story with a likeable melody that proclaims “Eighteen Wheels and a Dozen Roses. Ten more miles on a four-day run” and then mention “a few more songs on the all night radio.” Of course, I would revise the line to say “a few more songs on the all night COUNTRY radio.”
In fact, ”The all night radio” triggers memories of Charlie Douglas’ “Road Gang” nighttime radio program on WWL from New Orleans. The “Road Gang” was targeted at the truck driving audience. Charlie Douglas played Country Music. It’s the kind of program Charley would have liked. Charlie Douglas liked traditional Country Music.
Charlie Douglas also gave frequent weather updates for the four quadrants of the United States to keep truck drivers updated. Life Partner (LP) Mickie and I got to meet Charlie Douglas…and LP Life Partner a.k.a. wife Martha…. when Douglas served as Master of Ceremonies for the Jimmie Rodgers Memorial Festival in Meridian, Mississippi.
In fact, we spent time out in the park with Charlie Douglas, in Highland Park at the Jimmie Rodgers Memorial Museum. I should have taken pics of Charlie Douglas at the park and as he did MCing. But…that was pre digital and film had to be used carefully. No two ways about it. Charley would have listened to and loved Charlie Douglas’ “Road Gang.”
Thinking about Kathy Mattea songs made me connect to recent events associated with Hurricane Helene. East Tennessee and Western North Carolina. Ashville, North Carolina experienced climate related damage. Real Estate professionals liked to assure clients that Ashville was safe from climate change storms.
It came to me that Kathy Mattea’s 1987 Life As We Know It connected to the 2024 disaster of East Tennessee and Western North Carolina. Yes, Life As We Know It is a song about a love relationship ending. Yet the geographic setting and the termination of the relationship fits with the impact on communities like Ashville, North Carolina.
Life As We Knew It begins with a sad statement. She tells her partner of keys being left in the mailbox, it’s the last time they will call their place home, the cat’s in a cage to be left with his mother, and a U-Haul is full. The destination is significant given today’s destruction of Hurricane Helene.
She says “it’s been a while since I’ve seen Carolina…” and that by the time the note is read she will be “halfway to Ashville.” Sadly, she says she loved life as they knew it. She can’t believe they threw it away. Most significantly, Mattea’s 1987 lyrics conclude that it is goodbye and “life as we knew it ended today.”
That is really what happened for East Tennessee and Western North Carolina. Asheville particularly seemed hard hit. For the foreseeable future, life in Ashville and the surrounding region, people will literally be saying “life as we knew it ended today.”
Such a sad song. How did my brain remember it since 1987? And how can Ashville and North Carolina trigger a song like Life As We Knew It to connect to the impact of Hurricane Helene. There’s bound to be lots of good scientific research explaining it. Let’s just say that Eighteen Wheels and a Dozen Roses brought me back to Kathy Mattea as Country Music artist.
It’s logical that the Ashville, North Carolina geography made it possible to connect to Life As We Knew It and the sad ending to everyday life. It does make sense. Whatever the biology or psychology, I’m grateful to make the connections. It adds an additional layer of meanings and attachments in my life.
A final song, the third of the trilogy, triad, trifecta came rushing back in this process. Comes From The Heart doesn’t tell a story in the same way as Eighteen Wheels and a Dozen Roses or Life As We Knew It. It has had a place in my mind for other reasons. I think it’s because it addresses basic ways in which life should be lived.
Comes From The Heart uses figurative language…metaphors…to make key points about life. I think that at some time I even used Comes From The Heart when giving a talk to a group. Wish I could remember the occasion. I do know the point of my comments. I wanted to drive home that money, prestige, and fame would never be enough. You had to have passion for your life’s calling. It had to “come from the heart.”
All the figurative language makes me think it’s a great Country Music song to use in teaching language arts in school. It used opposites. If you want to have a partner to hang onto “you’ve got to learn to let go.” It then used ordinary life experiences…dancing, singing, and being in love…to make a point about all of life.
“You’ve got to dance like nobody’s watching. Sing like you don’t need the money. Love like you’ll never get hurt.” If you do things from the heart, life will be satisfying and successful. I guess that’s why there are themes in Country Music that use dance, roads, love, and even good versus evil. They help explain life and often point us in the right direction.
Comes From the Heart even reminds me of a wonderful, underappreciated comedy drama tiled Frank’s Place. Frank was an African American professor at Brown University in New England. Frank inherited a New Orleans restaurant and bar.
It was GREAT comedy drama dealing in race, class, and gender. Episode 17 Night Business featured a Country Music group The Hay Stackers singing ‘Pick Pick Pick Pick a Bale of Cotton. Pick pick pick pick a bale of hay.” The Hay Stackers became the entertainment when the shady promoter didn’t deliver Bo Diddley.
Most significantly, Frank’s Place connected to the core message of Come From The Heart in Episode 22 The King of Wall Street. A New York Wall Street executive spent a long evening in Frank’s restaurant and bar during stormy weather. Lengthy discussions ended with the Wall Street executive saying “…none of the A+ people are doing it for the money.”
Just like Kathy Mattea sang, it’s got to come from the heart. Both Mattea and Frank’s Place said it at almost the same point in time. Frank’s Place ran for one year in 1987-88. Come From The Heart came out in 1989. Both gave me the same message.
Well now. Getting Kathy Mattea’s Eighteen Wheels and a Dozen Roses stuck in my brain for several days is a lot like life. You never know for certain where something might take you. I would never have guessed that a superb one season comedy-drama like Frank’s Place would be coming back vividly into my mind. I loved it.
Before now, I didn’t link the message of the Frank’s Place episode to Come From The Heart. I couldn’t have guessed that Eighteen Wheels and a Dozen Roses would be linked to disastrous events of Hurricane Helene in East Tennessee and North Carolina.Life As We Knew It jumped into my mind, no problem.
I guess that what makes Country Music so marvelous. It links my life together. The meanings keep coming. The past and the present unite. It shows that novelist William Faulkner knew his stuff. Faulkner said “History isn’t dead. It isn’t even past.”
All my Country Music history keeps on giving. It’s a Great Spirit of sorts. It lives eternally. It abides, guides, provides, and drives. It’s a special soundtrack to my life. Country on! Country on and on and on!
