When It Gets That Way Lyrics - Dar Williams

When I want to go somewhere, I don't ask forgiveness 

I just go where I like, and he knows that. 

I walk alone into any party, I'm alone tonight 

In that high-heeled ego old hat. 

Oh blue night, laughter at the bell toll. 

People move like streaks of charcoal. 

Someone found a prince in the punchbowl. 

But high times fizzle out in a change of heart, 

And we know things fall apart. 

The morning's off to a bad start. 

It's raining. Have you had nights like this? 

I run miles to his place, wake him up to look at his face. 

I feel astray, and I love it when it gets that way. 

The child is so young, they say that child is truly free 

And with a mind of perpetual invention. 

So why is it now I'm a grown-up, all grown up 

And yet now I fly through the ceilings of convention? 

Oh new friend, borne out of a mind-cloud. 

Make believe and yet I laugh aloud. 

I've cried when you have stood ground. 

But sometimes playtimes are a ghost I've faced, 

In that room that I've erased. 

The air is empty and druglaced. 

I am completely gone. Are you still with me, then? 

With my head so big and awfully, 

Take my hand and lead me softly, 

And then you stay, and I love it when it gets that way. 

And when I was crazy maybe I wanted, I wanted, I wanted to be steady as an iceberg, 

And with nowhere fast a-going. 

Now, now I can handle the danger zone with hailstones all a-flying, 

And the crazy winds a-blowing. 

These days I haven't been smoking my lungs brown, 

Have that itch to turn my life around, 

Maybe move on to a new town. 

Cause good friends lifted me out of an early tomb., 

Pulled my life out from its doom, 

Like sun into a big room 

And where my roots have grown. 

I really can't let go 

Through the woods and through the fields climb 

Up the mountain into nighttime, 

Into the day, and I love it when it gets that way.