This is a very hard week for me. For one thing, I have to go out of town and I’m super busy even while feeling under the weather. And then we have a week’s worth of songs that I don’t especially like. Today I thought I would feature, “Over the River and Through the Wood.” It is based on a poem by Lydia Maria Child. She was an amazing person and so we ought to honor her. But the poem does not exactly inspire me.

Since I am the son of two black sheep, I don’t exactly relate to the song. We almost never visited relatives when I was a kid. And when we did, I mostly remember people arguing. But that is the way of my people. There is nothing worth saying that it is not worth saying loudly and angrily. This may be how it is that I developed a feisty writing style, but am in person very quiet and non-confrontational.

Anyway, I went through dozens of versions of this song and could find almost nothing that didn’t make me suicidal. But I did find this very nice and short ukulele version from Fingerstyle Ukulele Uke Channel. It’s actually pleasant. It could have gone on for another few minutes: