Kim Eaton

Skipping Stones Lyrics

Time Will Tell

Behind the Song

In 1973 I was living in Greenfield, Massachusetts and used to regularly visit a Dunkin’ Donuts at 3 am where the baker, named Vinny, would pass time, while waiting for the dough to rise, by catching flies with one hand. And make melt-in-your-mouth doughnuts. We would eat them straight out of the oven and would both end up with sticky fingers. He joined the Navy, we lost touch, and I learned that he didn’t make it through his tour. This song is for Vinny.

Lyrics

I knew a donut baker from a cold north land

He could grab a fly with just one hand

On the 3 am shift in the dead of the night

Grabbing dreams under 20 watt light

His name was Vinny he wanted to fly

Fighter jets across a clear blue sky

With those truck lights flashing on the beat-up donut sign

While his dreams left a contrail in a jagged line

Down Highway 9

Dreams are like flies you catch and let go

They only stick around for a short time or so

Let ‘em go if they don’t serve you well

They may find you again, down the road, time will tell

We’d sit on stools, stuffing coming apart

He’d trace the jagged lines of my palm in the dark

His eyes all lit up with those crazy schemes

Warm sugar on our tongues, sticky fingers on our jeans

Dreams are like flies you catch and let go

They only stick around for a short time or so

Let ‘em go if they don’t serve you well

They may find you again, down the road, time will tell

He flew the fighter jets, Navy’s finest machines

Shot down in Afghanistan, you know just what that means

I’m standing by the donut shop, time to say goodbye

Like he did years ago, now it’s my time to fly

I stick out my thumb, head on down Highway 9

See if my dreams will catch up with me in time

Dreams are like flies you catch and let go

They only stick around for a short time or so

Let ‘em go if they don’t serve you well

They may find you again, down the road, time will tell

Credits

Kim Eaton: acoustic guitar, vocals

Benjie Porecki: keyboards

Gary Grainger: bass

John Vengrouskie: acoustic guitar

Andy Hamburger: drums

Kimberly Eaton Hoagwood © December 2021

Muddle Through the Day

Behind the Song

When you have days that feel like you’re pulling your ship through a swamp with leeches on your back, just like Bogey and Hepburn in African Queen--on those days, the best you can do is muddle through it.

Lyrics

Racing thoughts are breaking through sound barriers in my mind

Where to go, what to do, and what to leave behind

Autumn leaves are gone now, bare branches shatter space

Heading north where cold winds kick your face

Heading north, cold winds kick your face

Interstates begin to look alike and so do towns

Walmart, kmart, shopmart, stripmart, different shades of brown

Looking for an answer to a question I can’t frame

It’s a raison d’etre with a different name

A raison d’etre with a different name

And the highway leads to nowhere in the sameness of these towns.

Looking for direction, where’s that lost and found

Silence spreads like snow, in the dark the cold winds say

Let your solitude hold sway, Hey

And muddle muddle through another day

Muddle muddle through another day

Roads are getting slick now as my hopes begin to shatter

Ambition called and I was climbing that slippery ladder

Get ahead, get way ahead, make sure you keep on moving

But the rules are gone, what are you proving

The rules are gone, what the hell you proving

And the highway leads to nowhere in the sameness of these towns.

Looking for direction, where’s that lost and found

Silence spreads like snow, in the dark the cold winds say

Let your solitude hold sway, Hey

And muddle muddle through another day

Muddle muddle through another day

Stuck now in a traffic circle circling round and round

Wind is picking up and the snow is dirty brown

Still looking for an answer to a question I can’t frame

It’s a raison d’etre with a different name, Hey

And muddle muddle through another day

Credits

Kim Eaton: acoustic guitar, vocals

Andy Hamburger: drums

Gary Grainger: bass

John Vengrouskie: acoustic guitar

Kimberly Eaton Hoagwood ©December 2021

Moccasins on Moss

Behind the Song

There was an exhibit a few years ago at the Museum of the American Indian in Washington DC that documented the terrible story of the many broken treaties with Native American tribes, the Trail of Tears, and Andrew Jackson’s role in murdering thousands of indigenous people. I wrote this immediately after that visit.

Lyrics

Cherokees buried their dead on these trails

In shallow graves on frozen shale.

It carved the ground like shattered glass,

Shards strewn about from a ghostly past.

As a kid I’d wear moccasins, walk toe-heel

And listen to silence and trust the feel

Of rocks, stones and stumps dotting paths in the snow

Knowing bones of the dead lay buried below.

CHORUS

I’d touch earth lightly

‘Cause moccasins learn to follow the feel

Of the moss and the ferns

And bones filled with songs so holy.

Walk slowly.

This is hallowed ground.

On a trail through the snow and the sleet and the sand

They were beaten and rushed from their own quiet land

By a bully and tyrant who would not defer

To the ruling of courts where their rights were secured.

His name was Jackson, he hated Cherokees

He drove them from their land and watched them bleed.

He refused to listen to the law of the land,

And broke his promise over & over & over & over & over & over again.

I’d touch earth lightly

‘Cause moccasins learn to follow the feel

Of the moss and the ferns

And bones filled with songs so holy.

Walk slowly.

This is hallowed ground.

Credits

Kim Eaton: acoustic guitar, vocals

Kevin Locke: indigenous North American Flute, Split 6 Siyothanka

Made by Master Traditional Artist Bryan Akipa, Sisseton, SD

Tom Teasley: hand percussion and sounds

Richard Smith: bass

John Vengrouskie: acoustic guitar

Kimberly Eaton Hoagwood ©

Skipping Stones

Behind the Song

After the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001, so many of us were trying to find an explanation to make sense of how evil can be allowed to obliterate innocent lives. Some people searched for supernatural explanations. It was part of God’s Grand Plan. What if there is no explanation, only question after question. Like stones skipping across water. And how do we face those questions—with eyes open or shut?

Lyrics

Daylight yields to another evening

See it sink into the west

Kneeling by the riverbank

Hands folded at your chest

Take a stone out of your pocket

Feel it smooth against your skin

Let it skip across the river

Watch it disappear again

Skipping stones across the water’s

Like kicking bones into a grave

A little leap across the darkness

Then it sinks beneath the wave

Flip a coin to figure out

Who will be damned, who will be saved

Skipping stones across the water

Why do you close your eyes

Why do you close your eyes when you pray

When the towers finally fell

And you stared into the sky

Searching for an answer

To explain the reason why

Did it happen for a purpose

Was it part of some grand plan

Your criss-crossed heart is tangled

Your head plunges in the sand

You’ve been praying for an answer

You’ve been praying for the rain

You can’t face the empty feeling

And the pain, and the pain, and the pain

Can you face the serendipity

Of clear and cloudless skies

Can you uncross your heart

And open your eyes

Skipping stones across the water’s

Like kicking bones into a grave

A little leap across the darkness

Then it sinks beneath the wave

Flip a coin to figure out

Who will be damned, who will be saved

Skipping stones across the water

Why do you close your eyes

when you pray …

why do you close your eyes

Why do you close… your eyes

when you pray

Credits

Kim Eaton: acoustic guitar, vocals

Dave Van Allen: pedal steel

John Vengrouskie: acoustic guitar

John Previti: acoustic bass

Kimberly Eaton Hoagwood ©

Leaving Dallas

Behind the Song

On my many travels between Dallas and Austin in the 1990s, I would find backroads through little towns. One such tiny town was called Blue, Texas. There was one sign on the outskirts announcing that it was unincorporated. Blue had a church, a cemetery, and a park. One day it was gone. I wondered about its missingness, along with dives in Austin that came and went, and people I once loved.

Lyrics

I’m leaving Dallas, headed for Austin

35 South past West and Holland

Cruise control, trying to get my mind off you

Been traveling alone and waiting on trains

Looking for Blue, but it’s changed its name

Summer fields sway in evening light

Trying to reach Austin by midnight

That broken bottle in the parking lot

Shines in the moonlight too

Got a rock in my pocket and I’m kicking stones

Trying to get my mind off you

Five years ago Blue had a name

Church bells tolled in the summer rain

Your eyes were like blue islands in the sun

Now the church is gone it’s a pile of stones

Graveyard’s gone, it’s a pile of bones

Think I see your shadow by the tree

Oh my eyes must be playing tricks on me

That broken bottle in the parking lot

Shines in the moonlight too

Got a rock in my pocket and I’m kicking stones

Trying to get my mind off you

There’s a bar-room fight at Mesquite Café

Hole in the Wall turned me away

Better find another town without a name

Now the rain’s coming down in the summer heat

Wipers tap a Bo Diddley beat

Midnight always shakes my memory

Oh how I wish you were here with me

That broken bottle in the parking lot

Shines in the moonlight too

Got a rock in my pocket and I’m kicking stones

Trying to get my mind off you

Credits

Kim Eaton: acoustic guitar, vocals

Kimberly Eaton Hoagwood, Songwriter, March 2022 ©

Mr. Bones

Behind the Song

This was written in the first few months of the war against Ukraine. The images of churches, railyards, playgrounds shattered and replaced with remnants of missiles. What do the bones of the dead say to each other? And what do they say to us?

Lyrics

If everything that can be seen can be sung in song, then

Mr Bones what do you sing of, there beneath the ground

Mr Bones the wind will send your songs through the trees

While missiles land by playground swings, swaying in the breeze.

Mr Bones can you hear the wind that comes alone

To carry blossoms over fields of flowered gravestones

That lie near miles of trenches where mass graves have been plowed

And weeping willows braid their branches into a shroud

A wail of wind where bones are tossed

And willow trees bow to the quotient of loss

That will not resolve ‘til I hear again

The bones that still sing, to not be forgotten

Sunlight slants in ruins of the church during mass

Near the railway station, rhythmic sweeps of broken glass

Mr Bones come with me, let’s go inside this church

Stained glass on the floor, a crucifix is torched

Flocks of birds above the steeple fill the evening sky

Mr Bones I’m looking for a way not to say good-bye

A wail of wind makes the sign of the cross

And willow trees bow to the quotient of loss

That will not resolve ‘til I hear again

The bones that still sing, to not be forgotten

Credits

Kim Eaton: vocals and acoustic guitar

Dave Van Allen: pedal steel

John Vengrouskie: electric guitar

Richard Smith: bass

Kimberly Eaton Hoagwood ©

Too Much Head, Not Enough Heart

Behind the Song

This may be self-evident

Lyrics