When a tune gets stuck in your head

You ever get a tune stuck in your head,  one that comes around like a merry go round, and you can’t shake it?

Please don’t come at me with Baby Shark.

For me, lately, it’s been “Me and Bobby McGee.” I don’t know why, but it started with me humming its most famous line, “Freedom’s just another word for nothing left to lose.”

Wow.

As you may know, it was written by Kris Kristofferson, now 84, whose early interests were in writing, and who was a Rhodes scholar.

He wrote the song on assignment, the catch being Bobby was female, and Roger Miller was the first artist to record it.

But the version everyone remembers was by Janis Joplin, who had dated Kristofferson for a time. Her version was released after her death, and it was her version that keeps playing in my mind.

But as I tried to sing it, I realized I didn’t know all the words, couldn’t really hear them all, the bluesy way Janis sang it. It was only after I downloaded the lyrics that I could see Kris’ genius with the idiom, the vernacular of the people in the song. Note especially the use of “I’s.” (You may sing along.) 

Busted flat in Baton Rouge, waitin’ for a train

When I’s feelin’ near as faded as my jeans

Bobby thumbed a diesel down just before it rained

And rode us all the way into New Orleans

I pulled my harpoon out of my dirty red bandana

I’s playin’ soft while Bobby sang the blues

Windshield wipers slappin’ time

I’s holdin’ Bobby’s hand in mine

We sang every song that driver knew

Freedom’s just another word for nothin’ left to lose

Nothin’, it ain’t nothin’ honey, if it ain’t free

And feelin’ good was easy, Lord, when he sang the blues

You know feelin’ good was good enough for me

Good enough for me and my Bobby McGee

From the Kentucky coal mines to the California sun

Yeah, Bobby shared the secrets of my soul

Through all kinds of weather, through everything we done

Yeah, Bobby baby kept me from the cold

One day up near Salinas, Lord, I let him slip away

He’s lookin’ for that home and I hope he finds it

Well, I’d trade all my tomorrows for one single yesterday

To be holdin’ Bobby’s body next to mine

Freedom’s just another word for nothin’ left to lose

Nothin’, and that’s all that Bobby left me

Well, feelin’ good was easy, Lord, when he sang the blues

And feelin’ good was good enough for me

Good enough for me and my Bobby McGee, yeah

La da da, la da daa, la da daa da daa da daa

La da da da daa dadada Bobby McGee-ah

La li daa da daa daa, la da daa da daa

La la laa la daada Bobby McGee-ah yeah

La di da, ladida la dida la di daa, ladida la dida la di daa

Hey now Bobby now now Bobby McGee yeah

Lo lo lo lolo lo lo laa, lololo lo lolo lo lolo lo lolo lo la laa

Hey now Bobby now now Bobby McGee yeah

Lord, I called him my lover, I called him my man

I said I called him my lover, did the best I can

C’mon, hey now Bobby now, hey now Bobby McGee, yeah

Lo lo Lord, a Lord, a Lord, a Lord, a Lord, a Lord, a Lord, oh

Hey, hey, hey, Bobby McGee, Lord

I have no idea if the last couple of stanzas were written or riffed. I also have a quibble. The diesel that “rode us all the way into New Orleans”? That’s 81 miles, and you sang “every song that driver knew”? Sounds like he didn’t know that many.

Like I said, a quibble.

Is there a tune stuck in your head? Tell me about it.