John Prine, R.I.P.

            Not long after singer-songwriter John Prine died, reportedly from the effects of the hateful, fearsome Coronavirus, I find myself occasionally feeling a little sad. But is this just because Prine is gone, at least physically, notwithstanding his musical legacy? 
           Or are there other possible reasons for my occasional melancholy? As often happens when someone famous and talented dies, we can reflect on our own mortality; which I seem to have been doing, at least sometimes, after Prine’s recent death. 
          We can wonder when our own time will come, what our life might have been like if we had taken different paths and if things had turned out differently for us; if we had made other choices.  
          In the past couple of days I have found myself searching online for Prine’s performances, and ultimately feeling better quickly. It’s easy to revel in this wonderful wordsmith’s typical and healthy sense of humor put to music.  
            Many of Prine’s early tunes struck a lasting chord with me. So, knowing he was hospitalized and learning of his unfortunate death, at just 73, I looked online for many of his tunes, performances, and interviews. In one interview he said Canadian music icon Gordon Lightfoot was an unexpected critical help after seeing Prine perform years ago in Toronto when Prine was just starting in music. 
           In recent years I didn’t often listen to Prine's music but I admired his talent. Maybe I naively thought he’d always be here. Recall his hilarious album tune, Dear Abby, in which a lovelorn young man sings to the renowned newspaper advice columnist, pleading for her help with his girlfriend in the back seat of his car, “with her hair up in curlers and her pants to her knees…signed, Just Married.” Or the recent movie tune, ‘In Spite of Ourselves,’ a ribald duet with Iris Dement about an average, blue-collar couple still madly in love with each other after all these years. 

And the plaintive ‘Hello in There,’ imploring those who aren’t old, to be kind and thoughtful to those who are. The song’s protagonist is an old man, reflecting on life with his wife; ‘Me and Loretta we don’t talk much more…’ and his palpable sadness thinking about their four adult children; three of whom seldom contact their elderly parents and one who died in a war. But that tune also works well in reverse, as Bette Midler showed in her fine version where the singer is an old woman reflecting on her life, ‘Me and my husband we don’t talk much more…’

In Sam Stone, perhaps borne from Prine’s own earlier time in the military, the last name of the song's title character is a clever play on words for a drug user too hopped up, or stoned, on one substance or another: ”There’s a hole in daddy’s arm where all the money goes, and Jesus Christ died for nothin’ I suppose…” 

I haven’t listened to Prine’s music regularly in a long time, and seldom sought out his performances or interviews online…until he died a couple of days ago. Since then, though, I remember how much I appreciate his writing ability and enormous musical talent. 

So, for the past couple of days, off and on I’ve been self-saturated with John Prine’s music and performances, loosely analogous to the “overdose hovering in the air” in his heartbreaker tune, Sam Stone. 
Yet, this too shall pass. 

My friend Mike introduced me to John Prine's music years ago. I feel fortunate to have been exposed to his writing and music, including his extraordinary wordplay; funny and serious. He has left a wonderful musical catalogue, a world of fans and followers, and endless hours of listening to his wry, sad, insightful, and sometimes hilarious views of life as he perceived it. 

Not too bad for a former postman who used to compose songs while delivering the mail.