Funny -- I never thought of writing up my own heartbreaks as a substitute for the songs I had learned from Warner, Ives, Leadbelly, Dyer-Bennett, and gawd-knows-who-else, because I knew, for one thing, that I had no idea what those efforts really felt like and so I couldn't pull it off to the same standard of music and poetry. When I stood up at the local coffeehouse it was to sing Trouble in Mind or Wild Colonial Boy. I wouldn't have written about Jenny Brown and her little sister because I felt I wouldn't be able to make a convincing song out of it, compared to the "real" stuff.

In other words, I wasn't good enough. I think the yonkers Jerry saw can be readily forgiven for wailing their wee souls out but they'd be better off if they spent the same amoutn of time learning to perform Barbry Ellen, or even Can't Help But Wonder or John Henry. That would give them some practice putting agony into song, and then they could make thier own appear in a workable fashion.