Wildfire

Listen while you read: On Letterman, 2007

She comes down from Yellow Mountain
On a dark, flat land she rides
On a pony she named Wildfire
With a whirlwind by her side
On a cold Nebraska night

Oh, they say she died one winter
When there came a killing frost
And the pony she named Wildfire
Busted down his stall
In a blizzard, he was lost

She ran calling "Wildfire!"
She ran calling "Wildfire!"
Calling "Wildfire!"

So by the dark of the moon, I planted
But there came an early snow
There's been a hoot-owl howling outside my window now
Six nights in a row
She's coming for me, I know
And on Wildfire we're both gonna go

We'll be riding Wildfire
We'll be riding Wildfire
Riding Wildfire

On Wildfire we're gonna ride
We're gonna leave sod-bustin' behind
Get the hard times right on out of our minds
Riding Wildfire 

~ Michael Martin Murphey

If you are of a certain age, you remember this one. It was a chart-buster in 1975. And it has been loved and hated ever since. Prominently placed on a list of "blatantly bad 70s songs," it became a long-running joke between David Letterman and Paul Shaffer on The Late Show until Letterman invited Murphey on the show in 2007 to perform the song. And it's a good performance! You can watch it via the link above. The piano intro is quite lovely. The 1975 recording appears on Murphey's Blue Sky - Night Thunder.

Murphey claims that the song came to him in a dream, recalling that his grandfather used to tell him a story about a legendary ghost horse that the Native Americans talked about. Little did Murphey know how popular the song would become. You are probably aware of why I selected it today, the fourth day of raging wildfires in California. Despite the song entering my brain, I had no idea who the singer was until I looked it up. I think Murphey sings cowboy songs in Texas these days.

Anyway, it's either a very pretty song . . . or a blatantly bad one. You decide.

The wildfires in California are beyond blatantly bad. I have dear friends who live in Napa, the heart of California wine country. They have posted themselves as "safe" on social media, but say they and their dogs are ready to leave if the call to do so comes. My heart breaks thinking about the kind of stress they are enduring. And if you have ever visited the Napa and Sonoma Valleys, you understand that the vineyards are the life-force of the region. Add another long recovery to the list of areas that have been devastated by natural disasters.

Hurricanes, floods, fires . . . what kind of devastation does the universe have planned for us next? (I will not hold the universe responsible for the possibility of nuclear war. That is entirely man-made. And you know what two men I will hold responsible.) I was four years old when loss of innocence visited me in the form of Hurricane Hazel. A storm named after the color of my eyes? And a year later, in 1955, Hurricane Diane made Hazel look like a rain shower. My memory has stored an image of little me, looking out the window at the dark clouds forming, frightened beyond anything I could articulate. I can still feel my fear. Was the end of the world near?

And today, over six decades later, I am still asking that question. I try to remind myself that the world has always known fear and destruction and evil. And yet, here we still are. Perhaps we have lots of time for more blatantly bad songs to love.