TheMaverick

I was a maverick wild and free
You were the woman out to tame me
Unbridled, unfettered, unpedigreed
How was I to know you were my destiny
The rides breed in the bone
But everyone I know's been thrown
You put me through the paces
Just to see what we might be

A typical male is a funny breed
Commitment spooks em'
And they all stampede
I was pick'n around through the stems and seeds
Putting in my time down at the factory
Well, way back there in Boulder
I gave you my shoulder
You chased me down
Until I caught you graciously

With life there ain't no guarantees
I don't know what you saw in me
You knew just what you wanted in your heart
You held those reins right in your hands
I was fight'n your commands
But girl, you had me tamed
Right from the start

You were a dark haired mystery
Little bit La Junta
Little bit Cherokee
Rolling with the punches
But break'n free
North of intention
South of sanity
Well I would buck and twist
But its all in the wrist
Without a doubt you rode it out
Until you saddled me

With life there ain't no guarantees
I don't know what you saw in me
You knew just what you wanted in your heart
You held those reins right in your hands
I was fight'n your commands
But girl, you had me tamed
Right from the start

The future ain't what it used to be
And so we improvise the history
Dotting all the I' s
Crossing all the T s
But even then equestriennes
Are a little hard to read
Driving down the road of life
I asked you to be my wife
Got a ticket for speeding
Just exceeding all my dreams
All the flaws are woven in
Like the blanket on my skin
She reads the cards
I wonder what she sees

This songs history starts back in 1990, when I was a fork-lift operator at Lycian Stage Lighting in Sugarloaf, New York. I was in charge of shipping and receiving by day and doing my artistic thing all the rest of the time. Of special note, both Peggy and Mark also worked at Lycian at this time.

The work that I did was physical and repititious which left my mind open to working out the lyrics to new song ideas. In the case of 'The Maverick', all I had at the time was the phrasing, "You held those reins right in your hands, I was fighting your commands, but girl you had me tamed right from the start". That was it.

Between other songs and other projects, it always got regulated to the back burner and over time it got swallowed up by obscurity altogether.

Fast forward to July of 2004. Mark was due to show up for recording sessions at Witchwood in Tennessee for 'The Roads Not Taken" CD. We both had a lose agenda of the songs that we were going to work on but I wanted to pull another rabbit out of the hat. I chose 'The Maverick'.

The lyrics were written on my half-hour lunch breaks over the course of the next couple of days.

Peggy was the songs inspiration, but it's also very autobiographical in nature covering the early part of our relationship with alot of hidden meanings. It was a very different type of a song for me.

Mark helped me flesh out the music and the changes, what worked, and what didn't work, until we slowly zeroed in on the finished version recorded July 2004