Intro To 'Youngstown'

This is a song about how

How quick we are to still have abandoned our own, you know?

Um, I was just about finished with songs for most of the Tom Jones record

And I was stayin' up at night and had a little insomnia

And I went-, went downstairs into my living room

And pulled a book off the shelf

It was a book called Journey to Nowhere, and uh

Text by a fella named Dale Maharidge

And photos by fella named Michael Williamson

What they did was they

They travelled across the country in the mid '80s by train

Uh, hoppin' box cars and all the way across into California

And up in Oregon and Minnesota, chronicling

What they were seein' happening out there at the time, you know

As we were kind of all sitting home and

Hearing about mourning in America

I was hearin' from a lot of folks that I was seein'

People who worked in different food banks and they report in the book that

That there were more people comin' in that needed their services than ever before

That there were people comin' in who'd never been in before

There were people that previously, you know, held-, held good jobs

Had supported their families

And, and uh, all I, you know, I finished the book in one night

And I put it, put it down, and I remember thinkin', well

Well, I'm a guy, like, I know, I know one thing

I know how to do one thing and what would happen if

You do-, you've done something for 30 years

And something that's built-, built the buildings that we live in

Built the-, built the bridges that we cross

People who've given their sons to die in wars for this country

Who end up thrown out like yesterday's newspapers

So, you know, what would I say to my kids if I came home one night

And I couldn't feed them or I couldn't

If they were hurt, and I couldn't help them

Or I couldn't make them safe, ensure their health, you know

I don't know

It strikes to such a central part of who you are