GOLDEN YEARS

Lee Ruth has been playing and teaching music in central Missouri for many years, and several players owe some of their first guitar and banjo chords to him, Cathy and I among them. Lee plays guitar with wonderful invention and versatilitv and sings with a warm, honest voice. His album, Happy Hollow Songs (available from Lee at Happy Hollow Farm, Route 1, Box 228A, Jamestown, MO 65046), is full of the loving care and artistry for which his friends know him.

Lee wrote this song for his parents' 50th anniversary in 1988. I rewrote some of the lyrics for my parents' anniversary, but I sing Lee's words here. If you should want to rewrite them for someone you know, I'm sure Lee would think that was great.

They were married on Thanksgiving Day in 1938.
Though times were hard and war was near, their life together would not wait.
And it took them an even dozen years to fill the house with kids.
If they ever had regrets, they kept them hid.

Golden years, golden years,
After fifty years, they're still romancing, still go dancing,
Dance the night away.
Golden years golden years
What a blessing to be love for fifty golden years.

Hard work and overtime, Mama worked as hard as Dad
To keep the house in order and the kids all clothed and fed.
And then one day they looked around, the kids were grown and gone.
It was their turn to do some moving on.

From Texas to Alaska, they heard the highway's call.
And it's northward in the springtime and southward in the fall.
And I'm always glad to see them every time they're passing through
On their way from someplace old to someplace new.

Well, I bet it's been ten thousand days I've enjoyed their company,
And it's strange to think that it's come down to one, or two or three,
Or Five, or ten, or twenty times I'll see them on this earth.
So, here's a song to thank them for my birth.