Song lyrics based off of my early Blog entitled Wandering Thoughts For Today

Sitting here this morning

With nowhere I have to be,

A thousand scattered memories

Keep coming back to me.

I don't know what I'm looking for

Or what I'm trying to find,

I'm just following the footsteps

Of this old wandering mind.

[Verse 1]

A song comes through the speakers

And suddenly I'm young,

Standing somewhere years ago

When that same old song was sung.

Then another takes me to the eighties,

To faces I once knew,

To dreams I thought I'd left behind

And things I meant to do.

I put the whole world on shuffle

And let the memories play,

Every song becomes a doorway

To another yesterday.

[Chorus]

The older I get, the more doors there are,

Some open nearby, some take me so far.

Some lead to laughter, some lead to tears,

Some open to people I haven't seen in years.

I don't know how much road is left

Or where that road might end,

So I'll spend whatever time I have

On family and friends.

Every song's a doorway,

Every memory leaves its mark,

The older I get,

The more doors there are.

[Verse 2]

Twenty-five began with promise,

We thought the time had come,

After four long years of waiting

For a daughter and two sons

Two children needing somewhere

They could finally call their own,

Threee little hearts that needed love,

A family and a home.

Then the telephone rang one day,

And the world changed with the call.

They said my mom was fading,

Not responding now at all.

We thought we'd have some time

To make the journey there somehow,

But sometimes life won't wait for us—

It only gives us now.

A few hours later she was gone,

And there's nothing you can say.

Sometimes when an old song plays

I still think of her today.

[Chorus]

The older I get, the more doors there are,

Some open nearby, some take me so far.

Some lead to laughter, some lead to tears,

Some open to people I haven't seen in years.

I don't know how much road is left

Or where that road might end,

So I'll spend whatever time I have

On family and friends.

The older I get,

The more doors there are.

[Verse 3]

Then came a day of happiness

The kind you don't forget,

We gathered there together

For the moment we'd dreamed we'd get.

A judge made it official,

What our hearts already knew,

Those children were our family,

And our family grew by two.

They'd already carried burdens

No child should carry alone,

But now they have their forever,

Now they finally have a home.

Maybe God had made a pathway

Long before we understood,

Taking something born from heartache

And somehow making good.

[Verse 4]

Then death came without warning

For someone much too young,

Someone woven through our children's lives

From days when they were young.

A husband left to carry on,

Two children left behind,

And once again one question

Started circling through my mind.

How much time do any of us have?

A year? A day? Tonight?

We walk around believing

That tomorrow is our right.

We make our plans for someday,

Say we'll make that call,

But someday isn't promised—

Not to any of us at all.

[Bridge]

So where am I in my life now?

That's the question that remains.

Did I become that younger man

Before the years and change?

I remember youthful dreams

And places I never thought I'd see,

The White House and the people

Who became a part of me.

For a while I thought my greatest days

Had happened when I was young,

That somehow all my victories

Were over and were done.

But I was wrong.

Success was never money,

It was never being known.

It wasn't titles or possessions

Or anything I owned.

We raised three wonderful children.

There it is.

That's enough.

Through the years of joy and worry,

Through the easy and the tough.

Watching children become adults

And watching their families grow—

Maybe that's the greatest thing

I'll ever need to know.

[Guitar Solo]

[Final Chorus]

The older I get, the more doors there are,

Some open nearby, some take me so far.

Some lead to childhood, some to goodbye,

Some make me smile, some still make me cry.

Some lead to my mother,

Some lead to my sons,

Some lead to old friends

And the things left undone.

Some lead to grandchildren

Safe in loving arms,

Some to old photographs,

Old lovers and old songs.

I don't need the answers

To every question anymore.

Maybe life isn't knowing

What's behind every door.

Maybe life is simply opening them

While we still have the chance,

Saying "I love you" while they're listening,

Taking one more dance.

Someday we'll be memories

In somebody else's heart,

A photograph, a story,

Or an old song in the dark.

And if that's all that's left of me,

I hope love is the largest part.

The older I get...

The more doors there are.

[Outro]

So I'll sit here with my music

And let this restless old mind roam,

Through the people and the places

That somehow brought me home.

Maybe I wasn't rambling.

Maybe I was looking back

To understand where I am.

The older I get,

The more doors there are,

And behind every door

Is a piece of who we are.