I now think that the song "I'll Be Home For Christmas" is one of the saddest songs I have ever heard. Of all the Christmas songs, this one most stimulates my memories of Christmas's past. As I advanced through my most formative years, moving through those same years as my Dad when he was younger, during the war. I now think of the precious and important times in his life when he was isolated from the world as we know it. I now realize that no one that hasn't been there can ever truly imagine the horrors of War.
When I was young I had no knowledge of the terrible tragedies endured by my father. He tried to hide the terror from us by not talking about it. I remember singers on the Ed Sullivan Show like Bing Crosby and Perry Como would croon heartwarming Christmas songs. Seasonal thoughts and get-togethers with family were very important to him. I never really stopped to analyze the words to the Christmas songs until a few years ago. "I'll Be Home For Christmas" has to be one of the most heart wrenching of them all.
My Dad was a pilot who trained in Canada after volunteering in WWII and was shipped over to join the RAF in the North African campaign when he was barely 20 years old. He would rarely tell me about his adventures overseas. I think he might have wanted to spare me from the horrendous stress and pressure that he endured.
These young men gave up everything to fight for our country with little worry about ever coming home. His plane was shot down in the Mediterranean and he and his crew floated around for 3 days in a rubber dinghy after the plane sunk. When the war ended, membership in the Royal Canadian Legion gave many of them a place to be with others who had endured the same kind of hardships. Although I was later invited to become a member, I never felt I belonged there. I had never experienced the pain of war. I felt I was not really entitled to the camaraderie as I sat and listened to these brave and courageous men. I let my membership lapse years ago and never returned.
How sad must it have been to be alone, a world away, in a hellish nightmare and dream of your loved-ones back home, knowing that I might only return "in my dreams".
"I'll Be Home For Christmas" and "I'm Dreaming Of A White Christmas" have to be two of the saddest songs ever written.
Have a Merry Christmas, but "Lest we Forget".
I'll be home for Christmas
I'll be home for Christmas
You can plan on me
Please have snow and mistletoe
And presents on the tree
Christmas Eve will find me
Where the love light gleams
I'll be home for Christmas
If only in my dreams
REPEAT
Songwriters: BUCK RAM, KIM GANNON, WALTER KENT
The song is sung from the point of view of a soldier stationed overseas during World War II, writing a letter to his family. In the message, he tells the family he will be coming home and to prepare the holiday for him, and requests snow, mistletoe, and presents on the tree. The song ends on a melancholy note, with the soldier saying, "I'll be home for Christmas, if only in my dreams".Kim Gannon claimed on at least one occasion that he was not thinking of the soldiers when he wrote the lyrics but of all people who are unable to be home for Christmas. When he pitched the song to people in the music business, they turned it down because the final line was too sad for all those separated from their loved ones in the military. When playing golf with Bing Crosby, however, Gannon sang the song for Crosby, who decided to record it. The flip side of the original recording (Decca 18570B) was "Danny Boy"
No comments:
Post a Comment