Riding With Life

I don’t remember the first time I heard David Ball’s, “Riding with Private Malone” but I knew I liked the song. Ever since then though, it has always been at the back of my mind, constantly reminding me to cherish life. Every time I here this song, it lets me know that there are good people out there who will help if I am ever in a bind.

This song caught me in a way I never thought possible. The spiritual nature of the song goes right to my heart and makes me think of how people are lost every day, and yet life just goes on without them. At least that is what I thought, until one of my good friends and teammates died in a fishing accident. Since then I have noticed once in a while that even though he is dead he is there with me enjoying life as much as I am. In the song it says, “I’d get the feeling sometimes, if I’d turned real quick I’d see/ A soldier riding shotgun in the seat right next to me”. It goes to show that even the people who are long dead help us through life even if we do not always see it directly. Another instance the song talks about the speaker being saved by a soldier who mysteriously vanished before anybody could find out who it was. Sometimes my friends voice will sneak up in the back of my head, telling me not to do something I wouldn’t normally do.

The first time after my friend’s death that I heard “Riding with Private Malone”, I started to realize that people live on forever through the memories of others. These memories can help us through life while keeping us in check and reminding us to not dwell on tragedy. At the end of the song David Ball says “I know I wouldn’t be here if he hadn’t tagged along”. I began to understand that in the future I will lose loved ones and friends but as long as I remember them they will live on with me and in my life. The speaker lets us know that with all the time in our lives we will be happy and everything will be alright.

Everybody has loss in their lives even in the most perfect cases. Most people turn grief into anger or sadness. I have learned to turn it into a joyful feeling because if you hold on too long or don’t celebrate the things you had while you had them you will find that you are never going to get them back. If you look back you should be saying, “Oh, thank God, I was riding with Private Malone”