My father was a drummer in a polka band. We lived in Milwaukee then, it made sense. He almost missed my birth because he was at a gig. His wake was filled with musicians telling me how great he was. And he was great.
Recently, while writing about my parents, I googled my dad to find an image of one of his album covers. I guess I haven’t googled him in awhile, because I discovered that in 2009, someone uploaded some videos of my dad’s band performing in 1974. (One of the videos is labeled “1964,” but I’m positive it was ’74: my dad was 22 and in the service in ’64, plus one of the songs they perform wasn’t written until 1970.)
That’s Daddy, on the drums. His stage name was “Al James.” (He wasn’t always in a polka band.) I’ve listened to his music since he died in 2001, but to see him again, alive and joyful. . .I cried for hours and was depressed all weekend.
The first video is a pretty normal set of polkas; I recognized almost all of the songs. But the second video, wow, did that one get me, and get me in all the ways one could be got.
[At the beginning of the second video, my dad looks at the camera. I smiled. Then he smiled. Then I bawled.]
The band sings “You Are My Sunshine,” a song I’ve sung a million times. When I was in sixth grade, my friends and I sang this to one another, regardless of gender. Usually just the chorus, though. In the video, the band sings the first verse:
The other night, dear
As I lay sleeping
I dreamed I held you
In my arms
When I awoke, dear
I was mistaken
So I hung my head and cried
Which is, of course, relevant to my interests. The song was first performed in 1939 (maybe), and the sentiment makes me think of songs like, “White Christmas” (1942): “I’m dreaming of a white Christmas. . .” And “I’ll Be Home for Christmas” (1943): “I’ll be home for Christmas/if only in my dreams.” This was a depressing time period, so it makes sense that the pop culture would reflect dreams as a place for fantasy, and melancholy upon awaking.
Though in some ways The Everly Brothers’ “All I Have to Do is Dream” (1958) feels like a comment on “You Are My Sunshine.”
When I want you in my arms
When I want you and all your charms
Whenever I want you, all I have to do is
Dream, dream, dream, dream
Sleep is a pleasant place to find one’s love. Though the singer clearly states they don’t want to wake up: “Only trouble is, gee whiz/I’m dreamin’ my life away.” The songs from the ’40s acknowledge that one must still wake up and keep going, while this song suggests just staying asleep/staying in the fantasy.
I wanted to make sure I had the lyrics for “You Are My Sunshine” correct, and while looking them up, I came across a blog post about the song, “‘You Are My Sunshine’ isn’t the happy song you think it is. And who actually wrote it anyhow?” The author explains that the song gets darker:
I’ll always love you and make you happy
If you will only say the same
But if you leave me to love another
You’ll regret it all somedayYou told me once, dear, you really loved me
And no one else could come between
But now you’ve left me and love another
You have shattered all my dreams
The song is more closely related to my beloved medieval music than I’d realized! Hopefully we can take the closing verse to mean the singer will just be sad and not do anything to their lover. I like the juxtaposition of “dream” in the first and final verses though.
In the first verse, “dream” is a place of fantasy. The lovers are united, and only waking parts them. But by the end, the dreams are shattered. Dreams of a happy life, but also perhaps restful sleep. Are these two different kinds of dreams and states of being, or the same? Can sleep remain a refuge?
“Dream” seems to occupy multiple spaces within pop culture: hopes, fantasies, what we want to happen, what cannot happen, and what our brain does while we sleep. Stories, songs, etc, slip from one meaning to the other, and the audience understands which version is meant. Dreams themselves are nebulous, so it seems fitting their symbolic quality is, too.
The band then launches into a song I didn’t recognize, “Show Me the Way Home” by Emerson, Lake, and Palmer:
Show me the way to go home
I’m tired and I want to go to bed
I had a little drink about an hour ago
And it’s gone right to my head
And I just stared at the screen through my tears. A song about going to bed? Really?
I don’t have much to say about these lyrics, but it truly felt like I was communicating with my father through the decades. Daddy was a jokester, so I think he’d enjoy a wink and “go to bed” then stay up with me for another few hours.
For me, it is the dreams that take him away, that twist memory into nightmares. These videos help me remember the difference between dream and reality, and reality is better.
Bad Sleeper 
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