Not All Seals Balance Balls on Their Noses

Lyrics Luke Bryan’s Tailgate Blues.

I catch my buzz in the black of night

Where nobody ever goes and the warm wind blows

If I lose my cool in the open and it shows

That I’m down and I ain’t alright

Sam sighs as he leans on the back of a truck he borrowed from a buddy. He takes a long pull off a beer as he sits, watching the swamp on an old bridge he comes to when he wants a moment alone.  He only ever brought one person to this special place and now she’s gone.  He’s never hurt like this, not from a lover, not even that marriage from so long ago had left a hole this big.

                                                                                                                                                                                                

I search my soul where there is no moon

The trees all cross and are covered in moss

If the crickets wanna know then I’ll tell them what I lost

Oh, I got the tailgate blues

What he can’t figure out is how he’d gone head over heels so fast for her. It seems like it was just last night that he met the busty blonde who had somehow, in her way, stolen his heart. He sighs and smiles as he listens to the crickets. He couldn’t believe her reaction the first time she heard them - she’d seemed amazed. He kissed her with that amazed look in her eyes, the soft ‘O’, of her lips and the taste of some fruity drink they had brought lingering on her. He couldn’t tell you when exactly he realized he was hooked.

I ain’t sure where it all began

Somewhere ’round here I know

This bridge was a little more crowded then

I was playing her a tailgate show

And now I’m just sittin’ here alone

Sam laughs as he looks over at the guitar his buddy keeps in the back.  He wonders if he could pick it up and play it. He’s sure he could make his fingers play it if he had to, but he can only think of that night and the song he played the first time he said ‘I love you’. Okay, if he was being honest he would have to admit he did it Jim Croce style and said I love you in a song. Damn Jim -- sometimes he had it all too right, and he thinks of the line from Thursday: “I was lookin' for a lifetime lover; And you were lookin' for a friend.”

To catch my buzz in the black of night

Where nobody ever goes and the warm wind blows

If I lose my cool in the open and it shows

That I’m down and I ain’t alright

He finishes the beer he was working on and throws the bottle into the air, watching it hit a rock in the swamp and shatter as it comes down.  Somehow that is exactly how he feels -- his heart has shattered just like that brown glass. Unlike the bottle, he knows he will one day be mostly whole again, even if right at this moment it feels like he will always be mere shards of himself without her

I search my soul where there is no moon

The trees all cross and are covered in moss

If the crickets wanna know then I’ll tell them what I lost

Oh I’ve got the tailgate blues

Veronica wonders what’s wrong with him. He likes her – she’s nice, and blonde, and she fits a lot of what he looks for in a woman.  He should tell her he first asked her out because she reminded him of another blonde but he can’t see that going well.  So, he keeps that to himself. He opens another beer, and sighs.  He shouldn’t have come to their place when he’s having trouble getting over her. He constantly worries one day he will accidentally call Veronica ‘Clem’. She thinks it’s a loss of a navy buddy that has him down.  He’s okay letting her think that.

Damn that AM radio

For playing more than a song

My heart won’t beat if the strings are broke

The melody’s hittin’ me wrong

Right here where she belongs

Taking a long sip, he finally reaches over to turn on the portable radio.  He groans loudly when he hears their song playing. ‘When your body's had enough of me / and I'm layin’ flat out on the floor / When you think I've loved you all I can / I'm gonna love you a little bit more.’  All Dr. Hook can get out is the first verse before Sam’s hurling the radio off the tailgate.  Somewhere in the distance, there’s the sound of something falling and splashing into the swamp.

I catch my buzz in the black of night

Where nobody ever goes and the warm wind blows

If I lose my cool in the open and it shows

That I’m down and I ain’t alright

Sam can’t believe he let his temper get the best of him like that. He’s a Navy SEAL, god dammit.  He should be better at controlling himself than this. He’s already committed two felonies by littering in the swamp. He’s not a man that really cares about breaking laws, so why does he care about this? He’s not one to act out just because it’s the thing to do. No, check that -- he’d rather go to his grave holding in the pain, than admit he has tears in his eyes.

I search my soul where there is no moon

The trees all cross and are covered in moss

If the crickets wanna know then I’ll tell them what I lost

Oh, I got the tailgate blues

Finally coming to the conclusion tonight is a night for looking back, Sam decides he’s got to accept that some things you can’t change, you can’t ignore them, and you can’t drink them away. All you can do is smile and remember the good times. He leans his head on the side of the truck. The time they went fishing in Hawaii comes to mind. How could everything go from so right to so wrong?  So Raw.

The crickets heard my story and I listened to ‘em sing

I guess I’ll close the tailgate up

There ain’t no telling what tomorrow might bring

Maybe me and a Dixie cup

But that won’t be enough…

Moving on should have been easy. Better than lingering on what he can’t have. What he wants. He actually has a full-on smile thinking about the conversation where they talked about what her name should have been. They had mad love many times, but no matter how often they made love that may have been their most intimate moment; a time when neither one wore any masks, no guards, no walls. A time when he watched her prepare to hide from the world. When, for a short time, he had a side of her he knew no one else got.

Yes I catch my buzz in the black of night

Where nobody ever goes and the warm wind blows

If I lose my cool in the open and it shows

That I’m down and I ain’t alright

Downing the rest of the beer, he sets the empty bottle back down beside him.  Drinking himself stupid won’t help.  Taking a deep breath, he lets himself think of something he said to her – well, they both knew it was true. ‘Girl, rest your head one more time in my bed / Love me like you loved me when you loved me / And you didn’t have to try / Let’s lay down tonight / And kiss tomorrow goodbye.’  He was sure it was some country song from some southern-voiced singer he would deny knowing under other circumstances, but hearing it in the bar when he realized they were falling apart made him point it out. He knew it was a last chance to keep her, but that failed too. As the song went: ‘All we do right is make love.’  When it comes to he and Clem, that seems to be the truth, and he’s somewhat glad he only ever heard that song in Milliways.  He couldn’t survive hearing it in his world.

I search my soul where there is no moon

The trees all cross and are covered in moss

If the crickets wanna know then I’ll tell them what I lost

Oh, I got the tailgate blues

Leaning over, his hands gripping the edge of the tailgate, Sam watches the water. A frog sitting on a lily pad sticks his long tongue out, and catches a mosquito. He smiles to himself, thinking again of the time he brought her out here.  Clem couldn’t believe all the wildlife, or the fact that she climbed into his lap when she saw a gator swimming by. It’s time to put those memories on a shelf, and leave them where they can’t hurt anyone again. Most importantly him.

I catch my buzz in the black of night

Where nobody ever goes and the warm wind blows

If I lose my cool in the open and it shows

That I’m down and I ain’t alright

 Lying back, his head flat with his legs hanging off the end of the tailgate, He thinks of the last time he saw her -- the way she looked at him with tears in her eyes, before she turned to her door. He knows he can’t go to her now. She’s back in Reno, out of his reach, just as he’s in Miami out of hers. As long as he avoids the bar he can avoid her. Never in his life had he thought he, Sam Axe, would spend time trying to avoid a sweet spot like Milliways.  But in the end, the benefits of that place didn’t outweigh the risk of seeing what he wanted, and feared would never be his. Sighing, he sprays on bug spray, and relights his big repellent candles. Closing his eyes, he prepares to spend the night alone with just the warm wind and dark night. Realizing he left his pillow in the cab, he sits up slowly and sees that the sun is rising. Maybe it’s a sign that someday his world will have light again.

Sam leans back as he watches her apply her makeup and hair spray and he wonders who’s had the pleasure of watching this woman work her magic on herself. He figures not that many but watching her work her magic something comes to mind.

“You don’t seem like a Clementine to me. That seems, like a name best left for southern belles from Georgia, Mississippi and Alabama.”

He has to laugh at the look she gives him. It really said every ting she was thinking without words.

“Don’t be like that Doll, it’s more like you should be an Elsa or something I think it goes back to that stupid song.”

To prove he means no hard feelings he opens his arms to her and grins when he soon has armful of his Babydoll.

Sam smiles as he wakes up beside Clem, taking a moment to watch her sleep as he reflects over the past twenty-four hours. There was a lot to go over. She slept relaxed as if she didn’t have a care in the world and that amused him. He was sure she was more complex then she let on and that was something he wasn’t sure how he felt about just yet.

Maybe he could take time and sneak in to the bar and see if that would solve something give him self time to think it over and work it out and decide what is really needed to do, or he can just sit back and enjoy the ride and let is go where it goes. Ending where it may.

    This is not getting anything done so he gets up sliding on some clothes going back to the bar to get the food coming back arranging it on the tray he found in the room he sets it on the bed including an orchid in a vase on the tray he leans down and kisses her lips slowly.

“Wake up Sleeping Beauty.”