“…You’ve got to ask yourself one question: Do I feel lucky? Well, do you, punk?” Although I wouldn’t ask the question in exactly the same way Clint Eastwood did in the 1971 flick Dirty Harry, the broad question is always relevant.

Sound Traveler has recently begun performing a song by Jason Mraz and Colbie Caillat called “Lucky.” Since the song was released only a few years ago and was recently featured on the television show “Glee,” we feel like we’re cutting edge when we sing it. It’s a simple song musically, with two voices and an acoustic guitar telling the story. There isn’t even an instrumental break in the song. But the topic, two people feeling blessed and grateful, works for a lot of people.

Lucky
Songwriters: Caillat, Colbie Marie; Fagen, Timothy James; Mraz, Jason Thomas; (2008)

Do you hear me? I’m talking to you
Across the water across the deep blue ocean
Under the open sky, oh my, baby I’m trying

Boy I hear you in my dreams
I feel your whisper across the sea
I keep you with me in my heart
You make it easier when life gets hard

Chorus part 1
Lucky I’m in love with my best friend
Lucky to have been where I have been
Lucky to be coming home again

They don’t know how long it takes
Waiting for a love like this
Every time we say goodbye
I wish we had one more kiss
I’ll wait for you I promise you, I will

Chorus part 1
Chorus part 2
Lucky we’re in love in every way
Lucky to have stayed where we have stayed
Lucky to be coming home someday

And so I’m sailing through the sea
To an island where we’ll meet
You’ll hear the music fill the air
I’ll put a flower in your hair

Though the breezes through trees
Move so pretty you’re all I see
As the world keeps spinning ’round
You hold me right here, right now

Chorus part 1 and 2

Ooh ooh ooh
Ooh ooh ooh, ooh

How lucky are these folks in the lyric? Do they have much money? Do they have problems? Do they have good days and bad days? I think they are probably like a lot of the rest of us. The difference between them and a lot of us is that they feel lucky. They allow themselves to see the blessings in what a lot of us might allow to pass by or take for granted.

In the first stanza, the guy in the song sings, “Baby, I’m trying.” That’s right. He’s not just lucky, he is also trying. By trying, he is allowing good luck to manifest. In the second stanza the girl responds, “You make it easier when life gets hard.” What? You mean she isn’t lucky all of the time? Well, she feels lucky all the time, but life still gets hard.

They had to wait “for a love like this.” It didn’t just happen immediately when they might have first wanted it to. Both singers sing in harmony, “I’ll wait for you I promise you, I will.” Much of the lyric is sung in future tense, suggesting that the fullness of their relationship is still developing. They have hope-filled dreams that still await them. But the last line of the last verse says it all: “You hold me right here, right now.” In that moment, each one becomes all the “luck” that the other needs.

Long ago Kenny Rogers sang, “Every hand’s a winner and every hand’s a loser….” But how do we play those cards we are given? Do we focus on what we think we lack, or do we focus on what we’ve gotten that no one ever truly deserves?

I know I’m lucky, and I also choose to feel that way. I’m in love with my best friend, and I am coming home today. So, yeah, I feel lucky…how about you? – Bob Tatum

Sound Traveler will be playing in front of the King Center this coming Wednesday night, before the Merle Haggard concert. Get there early, have a picnic, and enjoy the pre-concert concert. Also, this Friday we will be playing on the Indian River Queen. We’ve got our seafaring songs ready!

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4 Comments to “SongTravelin’: 01.31.11 — Do You Feel Lucky?”

• January 31, 2011 at 10:39 am
  Jacques says:

  There is no such thing as luck. What we perceive as “luck” is a perceptional construct that we place on random happenings. When circumstances are viewed from a purely objective perspective, all things occur in a perfectly balanced and non-preferential pattern.
• January 31, 2011 at 11:42 am
  Art says:

  A wonderful song of love shared. What could be a more poignant manifestation of luck than that?
• January 31, 2011 at 1:43 pm
  Bob says:

  Thanks Art. What a nice response.
• January 31, 2011 at 9:15 pm
  Patty says:

  Yeah, I feel lucky too. I especially feel lucky because I know who your best friend is, Bob!