words and music by Woody Guthrie
|
|
While we're on the subject of hard work, I just wanted
|
to say that I always was a man to work.
|
|
I was born working and I worked my way up by hard
|
work. I ain't never got nowhere yet but I got there by
|
hard work.
|
|
Work of the hardest kind. I been down and I been out
|
and I've been busted, disgusted and couldn't be trusted.
|
|
I worked my way up and I worked my way down. I've
|
been drunk and I've been sober. I've had hard times
|
and I got hijacked and been robbed for cash and robbed
|
on credit.
|
|
Worked my way into jail and outta jail and I woke up
|
a lotta mornings and I didn't even know where I was at.
|
|
But the hardest work I ever done is when I was trying
|
to get myself a worried woman to ease my worried
|
mind.
|
|
Now I'm gonna tell you just about how much hard
|
work I had to do to get this here woman that I'm a-tellin'
|
you about.
|
|
I shook hands with 97 of her kinfolks and her blood
|
relatives and I done the same with 86 people that was
|
just her friends and her neighbors.
|
|
Kissed 73 babies and put dry pants on 34 of 'em, as well
|
as others, and done the When thing several times, as well
|
as a lot of other things just about like this.
|
|
I held 125 head of wild horses, put saddles and bridles
|
on more than that, harnessed some of the craziest,
|
wildest teams in the whole country. I rode 14 loco
|
broncos to a dead standstill and let 42 hound dogs lick
|
me all over.
|
|
7 times I was bit by hungry dogs and I was chewed
|
all to pieces by water moccasins and rattlesnakes on
|
2 separate river bottoms.
|
|
I chopped and I carried 314 arm loads of stoved
|
wood; 100 buckets of coal, and I carried a gallon of
|
kerosene 18 miles and lost a good pair of shoes in a
|
mud hole.
|
|
And I chopped and I weeded 48 rows of short cotton,
|
13 acres of bad corn and cut the sticker weeds out of
|
11 back yards, all on account a 'cause I wanted to
|
show her that I was a man and I liked to work
|
|
I cleaned out 9 barnloads, and cranked 31 automobiles,
|
all makes and models, pulled 3 cars out of mud
|
holes and 4 out of snowdrifts.
|
|
I dug 5 cisterns of water for some of her friends and
|
neighbors and run all kinds of errands.
|
|
I played the fiddle for 9 church meetings and I joined
|
11 separate denominations. I signed up and joined
|
up for 7 of the best trade unions I could find and paid
|
my dues about 6 weeks ahead of time, waded 40
|
miles of swamps, 60 big rivers, walked across 2
|
mountain ranges and crossed 3 deserts.
|
|
I got the fever and I got the sun stroke and I got the
|
malaria and I got the flu and I got moonstruck and
|
skeeter bit, the poison ivy and the 7 year itch and the
|
blind staggers.
|
|
I was given up for lost and dead about 2 dozen times.
|
Struck by lightning, struck by Congress, struck
|
by friends and kinfolks, as well as by 3 cars on
|
the highways and a lotta times in peoples'
|
henhouses.
|
|
I been hit and run down and run over and
|
walked on and knocked around and I'm just
|
settin' here now trying to study up what else I
|
can do to show that woman that I still ain't afraid
|
of hard work.
|
|
-----------------
|
Woody's Rag/Hard Work
|
| Arlo Guthrie |
