| Omaha From "August and Everything After" Start tearing the old man down Run past the heather and down to the old road Start turning the grain into the ground Roll a new leaf over In the middle of the night There's a old man treading around In the gathered rain Hey mister if you're gonna walk on water Could you drop a line my way? CHORUS Omaha Somewhere in middle America Gettin' right to the heart of matters It's the heart that matters more I think you better turn your ticket in And get your money back at the door Start threading a needle Brush past the shuttle that slides Through the cold room Start turning the wool across the wire Roll a new life over In the middle of the night There's an old man Threading his toes through a bucket of rain Hey mister you don't wanna walk on water 'Cause you're only gonna Walk all over me CHORUS Start running the banner down Drop past the color Come up through the summer rain Start turning the girl into the ground Roll a new love over In the middle of the day There's a young man Rolling around in the earth and rain Hey mister you don't wanna walk on water You know, you're just gonna Walk all over me CHORUS I said Omaha Sunday morning I'm coming home today |
| The first time I heard this song I fell in love with it. In this song you have a repeated theme throughout all Counting Crows albums: rain. Along with that is the sense that the singer is drowning. Or feeling that way. Like he has to hold his breath just to survive. You can only hold your breath for so long until you just have to let it out. You may not survive, but you can't hold it in any longer. The chorus is about how the simple life would be a hell of a lot easier than what he's dealing with. It's a wish for the simple, farmer life of "somewhere in Middle America". It's a place where people don't necessarily bullshit as much. They're as tried and true as everyday people can be. And this song is about the desire to live in an environment where everyone around you genuinely cares about you. And they don't mislead or play around with your emotions because they understand the impact it can have. They tell it like it is, and that can be so refreshing. This song makes me think about the people I deal with on an everyday basis. There are very few whose word I take without question. I've been lied to, as everyone has, but it really bothers me when people take advantage of my blind faith that people will do the right thing when they have to. Even people I casually come into contact with make me sick when I hear stories about how they cheated on this person, bold-faced lied to that person. Yeah, they got away with it. But there's something lacking in a person's soul when they don't see anything tragic about betraying someone's trust. The whole human element of everyday life has been stripped away by a "hooray for me and the hell with you" attitude. And I wish things were simpler, because then maybe I could sleep. |