Willie Nelson's Letters to America Read online

  Then I got dressed, went back to the studio, and we cut the song “Shotgun Willie,” which also became the album name. Atlantic called it my “breakthrough album,” and I didn’t disagree. After thirty years of working my ass off, I was an overnight success.

  You might assume that success changed everything for me, including my attitude. Sure, I had more creative freedom and more cash in my pocket, but I’m not sure it topped the feeling I had when I was just eleven years old and got paid the first time for singing. That was like sitting on top of the world. Remember, I got paid eight dollars one night for playing in John Rejcek’s polka band. I’d picked cotton that day for two dollars. Now that was a thrill. That first paid performance was the opening of a door on a whole new life. My new albums for Atlantic were just the proof that I’d made the right choice by walking through that door.

  SHOTGUN WILLIE

  by Willie Nelson

  Shotgun Willie sits around in his underwear

  Bitin’ on a bullet, pullin’ out all of his hair

  Shotgun Willie’s got all of his family there

  Well, you can’t make a record if you ain’t got nothin’ to say

  You can’t make a record if you ain’t got nothin’ to say

  You can’t play music if you don’t know nothin’ to play

  Shotgun Willie sits around in his underwear

  Bitin’ on a bullet, pullin’ out all of his hair

  Shotgun Willie’s got all of his family there

  Well, John T. Floores was a-workin’ for the Ku Klux Klan

  At six-foot-five John T. was a hell of a man

  Made a lot of money sellin’ sheets on the family plan

  Shotgun Willie sits around in his underwear

  Bitin’ on a bullet, pullin’ out all of his hair

  Shotgun Willie’s got all of his family there

  IT’S NOT SUPPOSED TO BE THAT WAY

  All the moving around worked fine for me, but it was hard on my kids. Susie was a high school cheerleader in Nashville when we moved her to Travis High in Austin. She didn’t see the point in going to a school where she didn’t know a soul. I figured she might be blaming me, and I wanted to have a real talk with her, so we went for a drive one day, headed west out of Austin for a loop through the Hill Country. It was a good drive. We ended up in Colorado.

  Susie was behind the wheel, and I had my guitar and was writing for my Phases and Stages album. I had an idea that one side of the album would tell the story of a divorce from the wife’s point of view, and the other side from the husband’s, but I didn’t have it all yet.

  It was hard for me and Susie to talk. I had my guitar and began to write “It’s Not Supposed to Be That Way,” a song of a father’s words to his daughter, words that I found easier to sing than to say. All these years later, I remember singing it to her for the first time as we drove down the highway, father and daughter, crying through their love for each other.

  Sometimes it’s easier to say what I feel in a song. But either way, I love my kids—every one as much as the next. I also love to sing to them. And I love it when they get up onstage and sing with me. They can sing like angels, and it makes me happy that we sound so good together.

  DEAR SUSIE,

  This one’s for you. Always and forever.

  Your Daddy

  * * *

  IT’S NOT SUPPOSED TO BE THAT WAY

  by Willie Nelson

  It’s not supposed to be that way

  You’re supposed to know that I love you

  But it don’t matter anyway

  If I can’t be there to control you

  Like the other little children

  You’re gonna dream a dream or two

  But be careful what you’re dreamin’

  Or soon your dreams’ll be dreamin’ you

  It’s not supposed to be that way

  You’re supposed to know that I love you

  But it don’t matter anyway

  If I can’t be there to console you

  When you go out to play this evenin’

  Play with fireflies till they’re gone

  Then you rush to meet your lover

  And play with real fire till the dawn

  But it’s not supposed to be that way

  You’re supposed to know that I love you

  But it don’t matter anyway

  If I can’t be there to console you

  A LETTER FROM THE ROAD

  One thing I’ve learned. Kids lead to grandkids, and grandkids to great-grandkids. Here’s a letter I wrote from the road in 1977, on stationery from the Ramada Snow King Inn in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. My oldest daughter, Lana, had just given birth to my first granddaughter, and I wanted to send her a welcome to this crazy world.

  Letter photograph courtesy of Rachel Fowler.

  MY HEROES HAVE ALWAYS BEEN COWBOYS

  My album Red Headed Stranger was the one that finally brought my music to the attention of people all across America. Like Phases and Stages, I thought of it as a concept album, with the cycle of songs telling a single story that was greater than each individual track.

  Set in the Old West, it’s a story of love, devotion, jealousy, revenge, and, ultimately, redemption. In other words, it was a perfect fit for a new kind of country music. The album had triple benefits for me. The record was a hit, but it also got me into movies, and I ended up with my very own Western movie town.

  I always loved Westerns. When I was a kid, I’d ride my bike six miles to the town of West and pay a nickel to watch Gene Autry and Roy Rogers on the silver screen. They rode horses and sang and played guitar, and they beat the bad guys. That looked like the life for me. I’ve always wanted to be a singing cowboy, and that’s still the way I think of myself.

  “Redheaded Stranger” was an old song that was sung by Arthur “Guitar Boogie” Smith. I had played it on the radio in the ’50s, and in the ’70s, I would sing the song to my daughters Paula and Amy at bedtime. Sure, it was about a man who shot a lady for trying to steal his horse, but I guess that’s my kind of parenting! The song stuck with me, and I fleshed it out with new songs and a few older ones till I had the whole story of a man who murders his wife and her lover, then journeys into the West to seek redemption.

  When we made the album, I was planning to make a movie of it and hoped they’d come out at the same time. That didn’t quite work out, because it took twelve years to get the movie made. Welcome to Hollywood. The studio big shots wanted Robert Redford to star in the film. We waited, but like so often in Hollywood, nothing happened. So my pal Bill Wittliff wrote a screenplay that had me in the lead role.

  While we were waiting on that film, I took a part in Sydney Pollack’s The Electric Horseman, with Robert Redford. We had some fun, and I got a good lesson in making movies. Wittliff also wrote a beautiful Western called Barbarosa, about an old outlaw who is both the scourge and the challenge that drives greatness for a family in their beautiful hacienda in Mexico.

  I like making movies and always look forward to a good part. But when someone calls me an actor, I generally say my specialty is more reacting than acting. Let’s face it: no matter the role, I’m still gonna look like Willie Nelson. Luckily, I play myself better than anybody.

  We had a public screening of Red Headed Stranger last year in the streets of my western town, Luck. It was great seeing the movie in the same spot where it was filmed. Sitting in front of the screen in my Western Town, I felt like I was back in that movie theater in West, Texas.

  Like the Red Headed Stranger album, the film tells the story of a preacher in the Old West, who loves his beautiful wife and is fully committed to serving God in a wooden church he builds in a small town. One Sunday morning, as the preacher is conducting his Sunday service for the towns-people, a group of drunks gather in front of the church and begin shouting insults to the preacher, the people, and God.

  Rather than resort to the violence he’s capable of, the preacher addresses the drunks so sternly they
are reduced to begging him to stop. While I was writing these letters, it occurred to me that the preacher’s curse was a letter all its own.

  So here it is. Enjoy.

  DEAR LORD,

  We’re having some trouble here. The Devil’s own disciples have gathered at our door.

  So what I’m asking, Lord, is that you send a curse down on these heathens—send a visage blacker than night to pluck out their eyes, so they may not see to find this place again.

  Send a plague that will turn their lips and tongues to festering rot, so they may never stand here to harp and jeer again.

  And if they still persist in their evil mocking, send horrible and eternal death to each man here—and to the seed of his loins—in the form of a thousand generations of crooked vipers. Each viper with a thousand heads. Each head with a thousand fangs dripping with vile poison to strike a thousand times, until there is naught but a weeping and a wailing and great gnashing of the teeth to echo throughout this godless land.

  Amen.

  The Preacher

  DEAR HEATHENS,

  You cried that I’d gone too far and begged me to “take that back.” Your request is under consideration. In the meantime, I suggest you quit drinking on Sunday morning.

  RED HEADED STRANGER

  by Edith Lindeman Calisch and Carl Stutz

  The red headed stranger from Blue Rock, Montana

  rode into town one day

  And under his knees was a raging black stallion

  and walkin’ behind was a bay

  The red headed stranger had eyes like the thunder

  And his lips they were sad and tight

  His little lost love lay asleep on the hillside

  and his heart was heavy as night

  Don’t cross him don’t boss him he’s wild in his sorrow

  he’s ridin’ and hidin’ his pain

  Don’t fight him don’t spite him just wait till tomorrow

  maybe he’ll ride on again

  A yellow-haired lady leaned out of her window

  and watched as he passed her way

  She drew back in fear at the sight of the stallion

  but cast greedy eyes on the bay

  But how could she know that this dancing bay pony

  meant more to him than life

  For this was the horse that his little lost darlin’

  had ridden when she was his wife

  Don’t cross him don’t boss him he’s wild in his sorrow

  he’s ridin’ and hidin’ his pain

  Don’t fight him don’t spite him just wait till tomorrow

  maybe he’ll ride on again

  The yellow-haired lady came down to the tavern

  and looked up the stranger there

  He bought her a drink and he gave her some money

  he just didn’t seem to care

  She followed him out as he saddled his stallion

  and laughed as she grabbed at the bay

  He shot her so quick they had no time to warn her

  she never heard anyone say

  Don’t cross him don’t boss him he’s wild in his sorrow

  he’s ridin’ and hidin’ his pain

  Don’t fight him don’t spite him just wait till tomorrow

  maybe he’ll ride on again

  The yellow-haired lady was buried at sunset

  the stranger went free of course

  For you can’t hang a man for killin’ a woman

  who’s tryin’ to steal your horse

  This is the tale of the red headed stranger

  and if he should pass your way

  Stay out of the path of the raging black stallion

  and don’t lay a hand on the bay

  Don’t cross him don’t boss him he’s wild in his sorrow

  he’s ridin’ and hidin’ his pain

  Don’t fight him don’t spite him just wait till tomorrow

  maybe he’ll ride on again

  BACK IN THE SADDLE AGAIN

  When Kris Kristofferson, Waylon Jennings, Johnny Cash, and I were recording our final album as the Highwaymen, Gene Autry came to see us at the studio. All four of us had grown up on Western movies and had since made our share of them. Now that we were all growed up, we looked like a tough bunch of hombres, but as we talked with our childhood hero that day, we all felt like kids.

  This was not long after I’d named my son Lukas Autry Nelson, in Gene Autry’s honor. While we were all sitting and talking, Johnny Cash said, “Willie, you should ask Gene to sign your guitar.” Cash was all heart, and he knew what that would mean to me. Gene held Trigger in his hands and talked about an old Martin guitar he once had. Then he signed my guitar, a treasured and emotional moment that I couldn’t have dreamed of as a wide-eyed kid back in that movie theater in West.

  It got even better when Gene and all four of us Highwaymen raised our voices and sang “Back in the Saddle Again.”

  How fortunate I have been.

  DEAR GENE AUTRY,

  All these years since I watched you on the silver screen, I still get excited when one of your films pops up on late-night TV. Once a hero, always a hero. You were an inspiration to me and to countless others, larger than life and using your persona to encourage goodness in the world. You were a connection to older ways you admired, with an eye to years to come. And it amazes me how well your Cowboy Code holds up as good advice, even today. I still remember it.

  GENE AUTRY’S COWBOY CODE

  The Cowboy must never shoot first, hit a smaller man, or take unfair advantage.

  He must never go back on his word or a trust confided in him.

  He must always tell the truth.

  He must be gentle with children, the elderly, and animals.

  He must not advocate or possess racially or religiously intolerant ideas.

  He must help people in distress.

  He must be a good worker.

  He must keep himself clean in thought, speech, action, and personal habits.

  He must respect women, parents, and his nation’s laws.

  The Cowboy is a patriot.

  What more can I say? Thanks for leading the way, compadre.

  Sincerely,

  The Red-Headed Kid in the Theater Front Row

  While I’m reaching out to childhood heroes, I thought I’d toss this one out into the ether.

  DEAR WILL ROGERS,

  You won’t believe the mess we’ve gotten ourselves into this time. I’m wondering if you can send some advice for our current predicament. I was still a tyke when the airplane you were in bought the farm, but your legend lived on through my childhood, and recordings of your shows were still on the radio. Speaking to me from your place in heaven seemed like a neat trick to a kid in Abbott. Even after you were gone, you were a source of wit and wisdom in the face of the Great Depression and World War II.

  That inspires me to think that you may somehow magically receive this letter. Who knows? Maybe you’re watching me write it. So I’m sending an update and a summary of a few problems that have us running around like chickens with our heads about to be cut off.

  First off, the world is getting hotter. I think you spent enough time outdoors in Oklahoma summers to know that weather hotter than that could lead to all kinds of problems. We know what’s causing it, and we’ve had a good idea on how to stop it for a couple of decades but basically haven’t done one goddamn thing. Any advice?

  Second, having taken over all the Indian territories, our government has now moved deeply into negative territory. Our national debt is over $80,000 for every person in America. That’s $27 trillion dollars (that’s a 27 with 12 zeros and 4 commas after it).

  Also, since you lived through the Spanish flu pandemic of 1918, I’m wondering if you have any thoughts on a new virus that is sweeping across the world. Sickness and death would seem to be the biggest threat, but Americans seem more worried about running out of toilet paper. I figgered we can always use the phone book but was reminded that they d
on’t make phone books anymore. Clearly, we ain’t getting any smarter.

  You also advised to “Never miss a good chance to shut up.” So I will take that advice now and hope to receive a reply soon.

  Your radio-listening fan,

  Booger Red

  DEAR BOOGER RED,

  This is your radio pal Will Rogers, coming to you via very long-distance waves from my little slice of heaven. I received your recent letter, though I don’t know how. I also don’t know if you’re tuned in to my current frequency, but miracles abound, so here goes.

  I’m enjoying my time here and am happy to report that I was right: there are dogs in heaven. That brings me enough joy that I don’t think much about worldly matters, but here are a few things I remember once saying that may be of use.

  Regarding the temperature: “If you find yourself in a hole, quit digging.”

  As for the national debt: “Alexander Hamilton started the US Treasury with nothing, and that was the closest our country has ever been to even.”

  I hope that helps. Remember, things ain’t what they used to be. And never were.

  Yours from the pastures of heaven,

  Will Rogers

  HEAVEN AND HELL

  by Willie Nelson

  Sometimes it’s heaven, sometimes it’s hell

  Sometimes I don’t even know

  Sometimes I take it as far as I can

  Sometimes I don’t even go

  My front tracks are headin’ for a cold water well

  My back tracks are covered with snow