Today after church, my Dad and I were driving along towards home, and I had the wonderfully familiar and comforting experience of singing along with Dad to a favorite old song, "Romeo and Juliet", specifically the Indigo Girls version. I remember having several long discussions with my former boss Karl about which version was better, the Indigo Girls or the original Dire Straits. While I have nothng against the Dire Strait's version, I feel the IGs add much more to the song's experience. You believe the despair in the vocals, and it feels as though the guitar is your own heartstrings being plucked to shed the quiet and bitter accompaniment. Now, normally when I post lyrics here, it's a sort of cop-out, when I'm too lazy to post anything real, but I'm on a roll with this train of thought so I'm going to post these lyrics here anyway. Please forgve any mistakes, I did this by ear.

A lovestruck Romeo sings a streetsuss serenade,
He's laying everybody low he's got a love song that he made
He finds a convenient street light and he steps out of the shade
And he says something like you and me babe how about it?

Juliet says hey it's Romeo you nearly gimme a heart attack
Yeah well he's underneath my window she's singing hey la my boyfriend's back
You shouldn't come around here singing up at people like that
Anyway what you gonna do about it?

Juliet the dice were loaded from the start
And I bet and you exploded into my heart
And I forget, I forget the movie song
When you gonna realize it was just that the time was wrong Julie?

Well we both come up on different streets and they were both the streets of shame
You know they're both dirty both mean yes and even the dreams were the same
And I dreamed your dream for you and, and now your dream is real, so tell me honey,
Now how can you look at me as if I was just another one of your deals?

Now you can fall for chains of silver and you can fall for chains of gold
You know you, you fall for pretty strangers and the promises they hold
But you promised me everything, and then you, and then you promised me thick and thin
And now you just turn away and say Romeo I think I used to have a scene with him

Oh, Juliet when we made love you used to cry
You said I love you like the stars above gonna love you till I die
There's a place for us, ha, I know you know this song
Now when you gonna realize it was just that the time was wrong Julie?

I'm so in love I'm so in love yeah

But I can't do the talk like they talk on my TV screen
I can't do a love song not the way you sung it to me
I can't do everything but I would do anything for you, oh no
I can't do anything except be in love with you, yeah now

And all I do is miss you and the way it used to be, you know
And all I do is keep the beat I keep bad, bad company
And all I do is kiss you through the bars of this rhyme
When Julie I'd do the stars with you any time

Oh, Juliet when we made love you used to cry
You said I love you like the stars above I'm gonna love you till I die
There's a place for us I know you know the movie song
One day we're gonna realize it was just that the time was wrong Julie, Julie, Julie

Well this lovestruck Romeo sings a streetsuss serenade
He's laying everybody low he's got a love song that he made
He finds a convenient streetlight and he'll step out of the shade
And he'll say something like you and me babe how about it?