Leap Year – MP3
I wrote “Leap Year” fifteen years ago, in the deep, dark winter of 1993.
Syracuse winters were brutal. It’s nation’s snowiest metropolitan region, averaging 114.6 inches a year. I happened to be there for three of the top five worst years, the penultimate being the year in question in which 192.1 inches fell. That’s over sixteen feet of snow.
Worse yet, though, Syracuse is notoriously gray. The city averages 303 cloudy or partly cloudy days a year. And we’re not talking about the billowy white kind. We’re talking slate gray, table flat, horizonless clouds. A perpetually low, dark ceiling hung over us 82.2% of the time.
Adding insult to injury that winter, though, was my imminent graduation. While it’s true that my band, Smokey Junglefrog, was having a great time headlining shows, the question of “What next?” loomed larger than the Thorndon Park water tower just up the hill from our shared house. And while my girlfriend, Erin, and I were managing just fine despite being separated by the Atlantic (she was studying in Florence, Italy), the the question of “Now what?” permeated everything.
And while I’m not sure those influences manifest in this entire song, they do in the key lyric, “Perhaps tomorrow will never come.”
I’d all but forgotten about the song (which, in a then-familiar bout of passive aggressive avoidance, was never recorded) until this morning when, while running on the treadmill, I spotted the word “Leap Year” on CNN. Once upstairs, I dug through my closet and located the notebook full of SJF lyrics (before The Daily Journal, and this blog, there were actual notebooks full of songs, thoughts, musings, etc).
So here it is, fifteen years later, and still imperfect: “Leap Year.”
[audio:leap_year.mp3]Leap Year
It’s cold inside you know me
I want to hide but you’ll show me
I want to run and join the crowd
But you know that I’m too proud
In your lies, promises are just disguise
Perhaps tomorrow will never come
Got no time for secrets
I’d give it to you but you might keep it
I’d tell the world just what I dream
But they might listen to me
In your lies, promises are just disguise
Perhaps tomorrow will never come
So I’ll take it to the light
It’s cold inside, you know me
I want to shout out loud I’m lonely
If only silence was returned
I guess I’ll never learn
In your lies, promises are just disguise
Perhaps tomorrow will never come
