Leaving the warm arms of Angelica, New York wasn’t easy. Part of me wanted to stay among the farms and rivers of the Appalachians, the kindness of those newly made friends, and the far away feeling of safety that little town lent. But, as always, the road prodded me onward…

The long highways felt like drudgery that day. I knew where I was headed, but I ached to veer off the route for a while. So I did.

The story of the Kent State shootings has never left my mind since my mother first told me it. On May 4th 1970, the Ohio National Guard opened fire on a crowd of students. Some were protesting the American invasion of Cambodia and others were merely observing nearby. Four were killed and nine injured. My mother was hitchhiking from California on her way east when the news reached them that the girlfriend of one of her traveling companions had died. Her name was Allison Krause and she was one of the students shot that day.

I crossed the Ohio State line and headed toward Kent. Why I am constantly drawn to mournful places of the past, I will never know…

May 4 Massacre Monument at Kent State University

Kent State is a large, bustling University. Young students rush by in herds, jovial and seemingly unaffected by the large monuments dotting the parking lot, each one marking the spot where one of the four were shot.

I walked for a long time around the black posts that marked the spots where those four kids died. Jack London once said: “The most beautiful stories always start with wreckage.” And thinking of those wasted young lives, I hoped earnestly that Jack was right.

The next day I flew to Chicago and drove to my gig in Madison, Wisconsin. I wrote this song and performed it for the first time live at Mother Fools in Madison that night. Here’s a clip: