did you have a mean old man?

On my own
How could I have known?
Imagine my surprise
Just a fool
From a tree full of fools
Who cant believe his eyes
Imagine my surprise

I was a mean old man
I was an ornery cuss
I was a dismal dan
I made an awful fuss
Ever since my life began
Man, it was ever thus
I was a nasty tyke who was hard to like

I had to misbehave
I did things in reverse
Refused to wash or shave
I was horrid to my nurse
I got back what I gave
Which only made me worse
I had to have my way
Which was bleak and gray, oh dear

Living in here
One hundred years of rain
Such a drag
This riches to rags
With just myself to blame
A dirty low-down shame

Silly me
Silly old me
Somewhere outside my mind
Clever you
Walking me through
Willing to lead the blind
Just in the nick of time

Who gets a second chance?
Who gets to have some fun?
Who gets to learn to dance
Before his race is run?
Who gets to shed his skin?
Who comes up born again?
Who was a mean old man
til you turned him into a golden retriever
a puppy dog
who's a good boy?

a good dog.
a lucky dog.

We all miss our parents when we can't sense them any longer

We were ring-around-the-rosy children
They were circles around the sun
Never give up, never slow down
Never grow old, never ever die young

Synchronized with the rising moon
Even with the evening star
They were true love written in stone
They were never alone, they were never that far apart

And we who couldn't bear to believe they might make it
We got to close our eyes
Cut up our losses into doable doses
Ration our tears and sighs

You could see them on the street on a Saturday night
Everyone used to run them down
They're a little too sweet, they're a little too tight
Not enough tough for this town

We couldn't touch them with a ten-foot pole
No, it didn't seem to rattle at all
They were glued together body and soul
That much more with their backs up against the wall

Oh, hold them up, hold them up
Never do let them fall
Prey to the dust and the rust and the ruin
That names us and claims us and shames us all

I guess it had to happen someday soon
Wasn't nothing to hold them down
They would rise from among us like a big balloon
Take the sky, forsake the ground

Oh, yes, other hearts were broken
Yeah, other dreams ran dry
But our golden ones sail on, sail on
To another land beneath another sky