The Juke Box

The juke box at Waffle House unit number 1153 boasts a stunning 200-song library! Even so, most of the time it's just sitting there silent. Certain regulars will always play certain songs. One trucker, before he sits down, will always play the song, "Desperado" by the Eagles:

Desperado, why don’t you come to your senses?
You been out ridin’ fences for so long now
Oh, you’re a hard one
I know that you got your reasons
These things that are pleasin’ you
Can hurt you somehow

Don’ you draw the queen of diamonds, boy
She’ll beat you if she’s able
You know the queen of heats is always your best bet

Now it seems to me, some fine things
Have been laid upon your table
But you only want the ones that you can’t get

Desperado, oh, you ain’t gettin’ no youger
Your pain and your hunger, they’re drivin’ you home
And freedom, oh freedom well, that’s just some people talkin’
Your prison is walking through this world all alone

Don’t your feet get cold in the winter time?
The sky won’t snow and the sun won’t shine
It’s hard to tell the night time from the day
You’re loosin’ all your highs and lows
Ain’t it funny how the feeling goes away?

Desperado, why don’t you come to your senses?
Come down from your fences, open the gate
It may be rainin’, but there’s a rainbow above you
You better let somebody love you, before it’s too late

There's also a woman that comes in every afternoon wearing Nurse's scrubs who will load a dollar into the jukebox and play the Dixie Chicks cover of the Stevie Nicks song, "Landslide" five times in a row. She always has a bacon egg and cheese sandwich on white bread, and sits and drinks about a pot of coffee by herself while she tears through junk romance novels. Here's her song:

I took my love, I took it down
Climbed a mountain and I turned around
I saw my reflection in the snow covered hills
'Till the landslide brought me down

Oh, mirror in the sky
What is love
Can the child within my heart rise above
Can I sail through the changing ocean tides
Can I handle the seasons of my life

Well, I've been afraid of changing
'Cause I've built my life around you
But time makes you get bolder
Even children get older
And I'm getting older too

Oh, take my love, take it down
Climb a mountain and turn around
If you see my reflection in the snow covered hills
Well the landslide will bring it down

If you see my reflection in the snow covered hills
Well the landslide will bring it down.

I've never actually used the juke box myself. Unfortunately we don't get to play songs for free. It costs the staff the same as everybody else. Once a week, though, the juke box maintanence man will come through on second shift to take the money away. He will usually load up about fifteen songs and let the cook or whoever is around pick five songs that they like. I was busy cooking when he came through last week. So, Crystal, the waitress got to pick the five songs. I can't remember exactly which ones she chose. She's not a big country music fan, so there isn't a whole lot for her to choose from. I think she picked a Counting Crows song or two. I can handle that.

Step out the front door like a ghost
into the fog where no one notices
the contrast of white on white.

And in between the moon and you
the angels get a better view
of the crumbling difference between wrong and right.

I walk in the air between the rain,
through myself and back again.
Where? I don't know
Maria says she's dying.
Through the door, I hear her crying
Why? I don't know

Round here we always stand up straight
Round here something radiates

Maria came from Nashville with a suitcase in her hand
She said she'd like to meet a boy who looks like Elvis
She walks along the edge of where the ocean meets the land
Just like she's walking on a wire in the circus
She parks her car outside of my house,
takes her clothes off,
Says she's close to understanding Jesus
She knows she's more that just a little misunderstood
She has trouble acting normal when she's nervous
Round here we're carving out our names
Round here we all look the same
Round here we talk just like lions
But we sacrifice like lambs
Round here she's slipping through my hands

Sleeping children got to run like the wind
Out of the lightning dream
Mama's little baby better get herself in
Out of the lightning

She says, "It's only in my head."
She says, "Shhh....I know it's only in my head."

But the girl on the car in the parking lot
says: "Man, you should try to take a shot
Can't you see my walls are crumbling."

Then she looks up at the building
and says she's thinking of jumping.
She says she's tired of life;
she must be tired of something.

Round here she's always on my mind
Round here I got lots of time
Round here we're never sent to bed early
Nobody makes us wait
Round here we stay up very very late

--Counting Crows, "Round Here"