Lyrics That Hospital - Loudon Wainwright III

That Hospital

Steve, little Bucky Herdman, Pat O’Boyle, and me
Drank two cases of beer one night;
the VW hit a tree
Bucky wound up in the emergency room;
this was sixty-four or five
Well, I hear he’s living in Florida now, lucky to be alive
Oh, that hospital!
Oh, that hospital!
Well, my dad freaked out and he wound up there one Christmas way back when
Now I’m never gonna see him;
he was my age now back then
I kept staring out of that window;
I could not look at his face
He said, «I won’t be home for Christmas, son;
you’re gonna have to take my place
That hospital
Gonna stay there in that hospital.»
I was there again in seventy-six;
the wife was having a D and C
But in the end, she couldn’t go through with it, so three left: she, and me
And that little girl who was born there, who escaped that scrape with fate
A few months ago in Montreal I watched her graduate
That hospital
She was born there in that hospital
Yeah, my sister was born in that hospital too, and now my mother’s in there
I took the train to see her, Lord, and I sat in that visitor’s chair
Father was angry, so afraid;
this was not a blessed event
Now I’m riding back on that train, wondering where our lives went
That hospital
I keep going back
Hey, I could wind up in there;
maybe so could you
Anything can happen when there’s nothing we can do;
And if you come to see me, Lord, and you sit in that visitor’s chair
Take something home from that gift shop so you’ll have a souvenir
From that hospital