Music Monday: Seasons in the Sun by Terry Jacks

This week's Music Monday post takes me back to my childhood... I was 8 years old in 1974 when "Seasons in the Sun" became a worldwide hit for Terry Jacks.

This weekend we celebrated London's ninth birthday, and I'm feeling grateful for my family's good health and happiness. On London's birthday, I learned that a client's high school age son has been diagnosed with leukemia... while they will treat it aggressively and will have access to the best doctors at their local children's hospital, the odds of beating it are not good, so we pray for our client and her son. I spend a lot of time thinking about how, without frightening my children, I can help them to understand how very fortunate we are... how unimportant our day-to-day challenges (forgetting a homework assignment, losing a glove, a playground argument) are in the grand scheme of things.

"Seasons in the Sun," a dying protagonist's farewell to relatives and friends, is an English-language adaptation of the song "Le Moribond" by Belgian singer-songwriter Jacques Brel. The original French-language lyrics included sarcasm and references to his wife's infidelity - but these are often missing from the English-language adaptation.



Goodbye to you, my trusted friend.
We've known each other since we were nine or ten.
Together we climbed hills and trees.
Learned of love and ABC's,
skinned our hearts and skinned our knees.
Goodbye my friend, it's hard to die,
when all the birds are singing in the sky,
Now that the spring is in the air.
Pretty girls are everywhere.
When you see them I'll be there.
We had joy, we had fun, we had seasons in the sun.
But the hills that we climbed
were just seasons out of time.

Goodbye, Papa, please pray for me,
I was the black sheep of the family.
You tried to teach me right from wrong.
Too much wine and too much song,
wonder how I got along.
Goodbye, Papa, it's hard to die
when all the birds are singing in the sky,
Now that the spring is in the air.
Little children everywhere.
When you see them I'll be there.
We had joy, we had fun, we had seasons in the sun.
But the wine and the song,
like the seasons, all have gone.

Goodbye, Michelle, my little one.
You gave me love and helped me find the sun.
And every time that I was down
you would always come around
and get my feet back on the ground.
Goodbye, Michelle, it's hard to die
when all the bird are singing in the sky,
Now that the spring is in the air.
With the flowers everywhere.
I wish that we could both be there.
We had joy, we had fun, we had seasons in the sun.
But the stars that we could reach
were just starfish on the beach

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