The News from Spain...

On my way into work this morning, I was listening to an old song. I say it was an old song, not just because it was recorded in 1972 (and it hurts to admit that's old), because it was a song from early on in my relationship with Rosa.

When Rosa and I first dated, she broke up with me often.

She broke up with me weekly.

Sometimes more.

During one of those times, I heard a song by Al Stewart and dubbed it as our breakup song. In 1993, when Rosa left me, I made her a going-away tape, as usual I didn't think our splitting up was a great idea, which ended with this song.

The song is called "The News From Spain".

I have heard the news from Spain
Now you say you've many things yet to be learning
And you don't know if or when you'll be returning
It depends on how
Everything works out
If it can somehow
In Carvajal

And I have heard the news from Spain
Now you've found someone you don't have to be tied to
And he dried your eyes, and later he lay beside you
As the simple wine
Of the flow of time
Pulled us out of rhyme
In Carvajal

Into a taxi and down to the airport
In only the clothes I was standing in
A scribbled address, a toothbrush, a passport
The money we saved in the biscuit tin
Running afraid to a strange Spanish town
Searching the sands and the shoreline...

And I have heard the news from Spain
Now the Winter winds possess the Southern reaches
And the sea folds like a mantle on the beaches
And the crowds have gone
And I've left my song
To be killed alone
In Carvajal

Today, as I was listening to this song, I thought about how appropriate it remains. I mean, wasn't the point of Michael to find someone she didn't have to be tied to? And that little glint of hope she gave me last year all depended upon how things worked out.

And though Carvajal may not be a real place (is it? anybody?), how long have I been running afraid through these strange, Spanish towns, through winter winds, the crowds dispersed?

Some things just stay with you.