Don’t Fence Me In was a song we sang in Mrs. Nye’s music class in our Roman Catholic grade school
It was kind of an old fashioned song for seventh graders to be singing
I thought at the time
Maybe she felt fenced in with all the nuns and priests and the small paycheck
Teaching music to ungrateful school children who really wanted to sing
from Fleetwood Mac’s Rumors album
I liked that teacher though, as I liked most of the teachers from what is now called my middle school years
They were young and, I can now assume, probably desperate for their first teaching job,
They had bills to pay and families to support, and there we were,
our know-it-all smartass selves
Giving them a hard time and doing stupid things like putting Alka Seltzer in our mouths at recess
Our mouths foaming while we felt funny which gave us the mistaken belief we were brave
Having a group of seventh and eighth graders sing hokey songs they’d never forget,
that was brave
I find myself singing that song to myself sometimes, and it makes me happy, just like I’m some old cowboy on the open range
Maybe that music teacher knew that when we grew up, there was a strong chance we’d feel fenced in too