“ode to billie joe” Bobbie Gentry

I heard this song on the radio the other day and thought, “How do you write like that?”

4 minutes of life….singing about a situation….a family at the dinner table….four short minutes…simple language……but what a lot of drama to cram in to a simple setting.

Man…..what a great song.

I forget about some of these great songs….and then they come around again.

The good ones come back around again most of the time.

I used to love the movie that was based on this song.

I won’t claim to “love” it now….I’m a grownup and it might be kind of embarrassing to say that I love it now.

I can’t take being embarrassed again.

That might destroy me to be embarrassed again.

Kidding. I’m only kidding. I have a lot more resilience now….and I’m a creature of habit. I can take being embarrassed.

I STILL LOVE THIS MOVIE!

It’s the kind of movie that Jenny would get a chance to look over at me and say, “YOU’RE NOT CRYING?! ARE YOU CRYING? OH MY GOSH….PLEASE TELL ME THAT YOU’RE NOT TEARING UP!! OH MY GOSH…..DON’T LET ME CATCH YOU CRYING…..THIS IS THE HOKIEST MOVIE EVER….DON’T YOU START CRYING….”

But….I’d probably tear up.

SPOILER ALERT…..

Billie Joe jumps off the bridge.

That was a pretty tragic moment in this young romance.

Who has a heart hard enough to keep them from crying a little when something unexpected like that happens?

Anyway…it’s a great teen romance….rural teen romance.

How many of those do they make these days where somebody doesn’t turn into a werewolf or a vampire?

Now it would be about Billie Joe getting torn limb from limb by some beast from the netherworld and then thrown off the bridge.

That wouldn’t make me cry.

That would be too violent.

Anyway….great song and a great….in its own way….movie.

I’ll confess to it being one that I watched for in the television forecast when I was younger….back before I rented my first VCR.

And….I guess that Billie Joe McCallister jumped off the Tallahatchie Bridge.

That tore Glynnis O’Connor up, man.

Me….too.