For Who I Am One day my wife asked me the question most of us guys dread answering: 'Tell me, what you are thinking?' My first thought is, 'What do I say now?!?' We don't like revealing what's on our hearts and minds, what we fear, what makes us stay awake at night. When we do reveal ourselves, we often do so at great risk, because we fear rejection and, frankly, we might be rejected. But in the context of a loving relationship, when we share these innermost thoughts and feelings, we are usually rewarded, because we discover that our partner loves us because of-or in spite of-them. Second Chance My wife and I were married in May, 2010. This song recounts the sequence of events - our wedding day and subsequent honeymoon in Key West. The refrain, 'we have this second chance / the start of a new romance' alludes to both of our experiences. In my case, my first wife Amie died in 2008 after a short, acute battle with stage IV stomach cancer. During that time she also lost a baby, a girl we named Bianca. In the case of my second wife, Megan, that same year she ended a four year relationship with her fianc a month before they were to be married. The reference to Van Morrison is from the first dance at our wedding, 'Have I Told You Lately' in which he sings 'There's a love that's divine / and it's yours and it's mine, like the sun.' The locations I refer to are flying down to Miami, driving to Key West (including the Seven Mile Bridge) and walking the main drag in Key West, the famous Duval Street. In Key West, chickens roam free throughout the island, and we actually saw one crossing the road, stopping traffic on Duval! Be Your Ordinary I had this concept for a song about being a 'regular guy' that morphed into being an 'ordinary guy.' Parallel to that idea is the fact that, though I might be able to write good songs and am a musician, I am definitely not 'hip'! And I'm okay with that. The concept is so familiar that it is hard to say something new about it. What is new is the use of 'ordinary' as a noun rather than a descriptive adjective. I think this, combined with the rhythm that is similar to 'Beautiful Heart' gives the song a playful, light flavor. The lyrical twist is, being ordinary, familiar, commonplace, normal is, these days, unique, and that's what women, or at least some women, really want in their men. I'm Back in Ohio Megan and I were listening to the Billy Ray Cyrus song 'Back in Tennessee.' It's a deeply personal song about getting back to a place, literally, emotionally and spiritually in which he feels he belongs. We were joking about the fact that it is a surefire way to success to write a song with a city or state in the title! She challenged me to write one. And, sure enough, I thought about my own life journey and where I'm living now, unlike Billy Ray, in my adopted home of Columbus. The first verse recounts a time in 2009 in which I visited friends and family in the New York City area. It was around that time I began dating Megan, and on the ride home I had a lot of time to think about my life and all I had been through. When I arrived in Ohio, and saw Megan again, I felt as if I was home. Fun in the Sun I wrote this song shortly after we returned from Key West, which may be one of the top two or three people watching locales in the country. We were newly married, so we were also watching ourselves, so to speak. Seeing guys-old and not so old--wearing black dress socks with their sandals (ugly!), people walking Duval Street totally drunk in the middle of the day (hmmm... including myself?). Of course we were also reflecting ourselves, as reflected in the third verse, 'Honey, let's get married / what have we got to lose?' We've had so much heartache and heaviness in our lives, Key West was the perfect elixir for us, carefree, sunny, fun. We knew we were going back to 'real life' but since we're (relatively) 'wild and young' let's have fun down here. And let's retain some of that youthful, fun-loving attitude ('we've only just begun) after we leave. Good to Be a Girl This song was written about six years
