The other day, these words and the familiar sound of Johnny Cash’s steady as a train, dry as the desert voice just popped into my head. Completely out of nowhere. I hadn’t heard the music, the song, not even any of the single words. I really have no idea why they popped into my head. But they did.

And for some reason they really spoke to me. On a deep level. And I thought yes. That is exactly what I’m going to do. Break my rusty cage and run. Get past all those same old things that hold me back, keep me captive in the deepest corners of my mind, and just go for it. Full steam ahead. Just like that big ole train Johnny sings about.

The words, the thoughts, wouldn’t let me rest. They just kept swirling around in my mind. At work, when I was trying to write about Tasmanian wildlife. I just couldn’t stop thinking about it, hearing the sound of those words in my head. So I went on YouTube and listened to the song. Not enough. I realised I didn’t even know all the words. Mainly just the chorus. Those words. So I started Googling.

The rest of the words are actually pretty dark. Literally tortured. I wondered what they meant. Kept Googling. Couldn’t find one. But then I realised, songs don’t really have a meaning. They mean nothing and everything. Everyone always finds their own meaning hidden between the lyrics and the melody, the rhythm and the arrangement. The big surprise was finding out it was actually a Soundgarden song.

I like Soundgarden and have always been a big fan of Johnny Cash but I had never realised the song was originally written by Chris Cornell for Soundgarden. It just sounded so much like a Johnny song. I guess I’d never really thought about it. Isn’t it funny. You think you know something. For years. You never even think to question it. But an instant of bothering to look at it differently, really think about it and suddenly you have discovered something new. Suddenly you are wrong.