Things I Forgot To Throw Away

Found an old motel key

In the pocket of a winter coat

Don’t remember where I got it

Don’t remember why I

kept it

There’s a paper from a club in Memphis

With my name typed way too small

Somebody circled Friday night

And wrote “call before you come”

I never did

I’ve got things I forgot to throw away

Stuff that followed me from town to town

Some of it ain’t worth a nickel

Some of it could buy the whole house down

There’s a lot I don’t remember

There’s a lot I’d rather not

But every time I clean a drawer I find another piece of

who I was

(ooh, yeah)

Found three guitar picks

With somebody else’s initials

A photograph with a corner torn

And six numbers on the back

There’s a hotel bill from Dallas

For a room I swear I never saw

And a set list written on a napkin

With somebody’s dinner still dried on it

I laughed at that one

There’s a letter from my mother

Telling me to call when I got home

I must’ve carried that one with me

Long after she was gone

There’s a picture of my old band

Everybody’s twenty-three

We look like we knew exactly

What the hell we were doing

We didn’t

Maybe that’s why I keep this stuff Not because it matters much

But because someday I might forget

The sound of that old room

The smell of somebody’s cigarette

The drummer counting four

The crowd going quiet

Right before the first chord

Funny thing about getting older…

You don’t miss every place you went.

Sometimes you just miss

Who you were when you got there.

I’ve got things I forgot to throw away

Still sitting in that bottom drawer

Old receipts and busted picks

Names I don’t remember anymore

And I don’t need to keep them

I know that much is true

But every time I throw one out I find myself keeping two (hahaha)

“Guess I’ll clean that drawer tomorrow.”