WHY NOT TAKE ALL OF ME?


It's 35 years later, and I'm sitting next to my daughter, Marcy, at a Willie Nelson concert. Bittersweet memories kept flooding into my consciousness, making me yearn to experience that time once more but happy at the same time for having had it at all.

We had just bought a new tape of Willie Nelson all those years ago,  which contained "All of Me," a song made famous by Billie Holiday.

We loved playing that song, over and over. Our three-year-old daughter, Marcy, started singing along, although the lyric "take these lips, I'll never use them" became "take these yips."  We loved hearing her sing with Willie.  

Willie didn't sing this particular song tonight. He is 84 years old at this point and only sang maybe five or six tunes at a concert primarily used to promote his two youngest sons, one of whom is well on his way to developing as a musician.

It didn't matter, though. I was sitting alongside my daughter, who happened to know all the lyrics to the too few songs he sang.   We sang them together with arms punching out into the air in beat to the music accompanied by loud giggles following each belted note.

We'll always have our favorite Willie Nelson song: 

All of me, why not take all of me?
Can't you see I'm no good without you?
Take my arms. I want to lose them
Take these lips. I'll never use them.

Your goodbye left me with eyes that cry
And I know I'm no good without you
You took apart what once was my heart
So why not take all of me?

Tonight, I got to sing along with Marcy and Willie.   One more time.  





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