The River of Dreams

I sing to the boys most nights, and most often, Felix being much the less resistant, I sing just to Gideon, and so to his requests. He certainly has his favorites: "City of New Orleans," "Dr. Livingstone, I Presume," "Bridge Over Troubled Water." Most of these he's learned to choose by following Felix's lead on those nights Felix manages to stay awake a bit, but there's one he requests regularly that Felix, as it happens, has never heard: "River of Dreams."

Felix passed out before I even started this evening, but Gideon was ready with his desired playlist:  "Dr. Livingstone," then "City of New Orleans," which I vetoed in favor of more Moody Blues, specifically "And the Tide Rushes In," but he interrupted that to ask for "the song about searching for something." OK then:

In the middle of the night
I go walking in my sleep
From the mountains of faith
To a river so deep
I must be looking for something
Something sacred I lost
But the river is wide
And it's too hard to cross

And even though I know the river is wide
I walk down every evening and I stand on the shore
And try to cross to the opposite side
So I can finally find what I've been looking for

In the middle of the night
I go walking in my sleep
Through the valley of fear
To a river so deep
And I've been searching for something
Taken out of my soul
Something I would never lose
Something somebody stole

I don't know why I go walking at night
But now I'm tired and I don't want to walk anymore
I hope it doesn't take the rest of my life
Until I find what it is that I've been looking for

In the middle of the night
I go walking in my sleep
Through the jungle of doubt
To a river so deep
I know I'm searching for something
Something so undefined
That it can only be seen
By the eyes of the blind
In the middle of the night

I'm not sure about a life after this
God knows I've never been a spiritual man
Baptized by the fire, I wade into the river
That runs to the promised land
In the middle of the night
I go walking in my sleep
Through the desert of truth
To the river so deep
We all end in the ocean
We all start in the streams
We're all carried along
By the river of dreams
In the middle of the night

Somewhere around "the jungle of doubt" Gideon began making noises I took to be caused by the heavy breathing associated with deep sleep. I finished the song nonetheless but in the quiet room realized he wasn't asleep at all but was instead sobbing into his pillow. "Why are you crying, little guy?" I asked, repeating myself twice more before I got an intelligible answer: "I'm missing something too-hoo-hoo-hoo."

I'd had some indication previously that Gideon listens to lyrics. Perhaps you saw this exchange on my Facebook feed:

Gideon, coolly: Dad, you have to die.
Me, keeping my cool: Why's that?
Gideon: Because every man has to die.

This was a reference to "Brothers in Arms," a favorite I've since retired for what I trust are obvious reasons. I hope I don't have to do the same for this Billy Joel number: it fits my range precisely and has many good associations (Hi Honey!), among them a lovely day in Central Park, when I encountered a barbershop quartet just killing it over by the bandshell. I can't pretend, solo, to be replicating their sound (it was something like this, except as sung by four large, animated, black men, native English speakers all, snapping their fingers, tapping their toes, and with simply magnificent voices), but I do the song upbeat, nothing of the dirge to it. Still, Gideon gets it.

We will never know what it is Gideon is missing, but I can tell you why he's so terribly sad about it: he always gets histrionic the evening of a day spent in his new daycare. Overtired I suppose, and overemotional, but whatever the cause we can't end the day like that. So we turned to another old favorite, one I sing slow and somber, but which Gideon, listening to the lyrics, knows means well: "Sunny."