I’m Not Gonna Let You Fade Away
Sometimes when I think about the kind of person I want to be, the kind of love I want to be capable of giving (though I often fall short because I’m scared or because it’s too painful or because I’ve lost belief in the value and power of my own love or for whatever reason), I think of the music of Jens Lekman.
He has this one song called “A Postcard to Nina,” an apparently true story about pretending to be the boyfriend of his lesbian friend Nina for the sake of her father.
Nina, I can be your boyfriend
So you can stay with your girlfriend
Your father is a sweet old man
But it’s hard for him to understand
That you want to love a woman
Oh god, what have I done?
I came to Berlin to have some fun
The clock on the wall strikes four, five, six
On your father’s wall, a big crucifix
I guess that’s why he won’t let you go
His Catholic heart is big and slow
You know I’d do anything for love but
Nina, what were you thinking of?
But Nina, I can be your boyfriend
So you can stay with your girlfriend
Your father’s mailing all the time
He says he just wants to say hi
I send back out of office autoreplies
Nina I just want to check in
‘Cause I think about you every second
So I send you this postcard just to say
Don’t let anyone stand in your way
Yours truly, Jens Lekman
And hearing all that, I get the sense that Jens would do anything for love, and not just romantic love, but for the love of a friend, too, though when he says “I think about you every second,” I wonder if he isn’t half in love with Nina himself.
Now, in 2015, Lekman is recording a song a week, in a series he’s calling “postcards.” The second, like “A Postcard to Nina,” is a story of love and friendship.
When he was born I thought I’d leave you alone
I thought you had enough to deal with on your own
You said silence is a sad ringtone
When people stopped calling, you’d never felt so alone
Well I’m not gonna let you fade away
I’ll go with you to the matinee
Help you clean up the dribble on his chin
Keep you updated on the gossipin’
And when summer comes and the sun is high
I’ll take you to the countryside
My parents got a little cottage
There’s room for you and the cabbage
I love that he says “I’m not gonna let you fade away.” I think that sometimes, in order to feel that we really exist, in order to know that we’re not fading away, we need to exist in the presence of love, and that someone’s presence in our lives, if it acknowledges us as we are, can be the greatest and most essential part of love.
Notes
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