iTunes Playlist - an Update

I'm still working my alphabetical way through my iTunes playlist - through the O's and onto the P's. Surprising how many song titles I have that begin with the world Only. I've I've said before, songwriters are an assertive group, aren't they? No fudging around with things, they're always one thing or the other and nothing in between.

There is one song in the O's that deserves a little closer attention. Here are the lyrics to The Old Apartment by The Barenaked Ladies: (Ooh: "Barenaked Ladies." That'll get me a lot of Google hits.)

Broke into the old apartment
This is where we used to live
Broken glass, broke and hungry
Broken hearts and broken bones
This is where we used to live

Why did you paint the walls?
Why did you clean the floor?
Why did you plaster over the hole I punched in the door?
This is where we used to live

Why did you keep the mousetrap?
Why did you keep the dishrack?
These things used to be mine
I guess they still are, I want them back

Broke into the old apartment
Forty-two stairs from the street
Crooked landing, crooked landlord
Narrow laneway filled with crooks.
This is where we used to live.

Why did they pave the lawn?
Why did they change the locks?
Why did I have to break it, I only came here to talk
This is where we used to live

How is the neighbor downstairs?
How is her temper this year?
I turned up your tv and stomped on the floor just for fun
I know we dont live here anymore
We bought an old house on the danforth
She loves me and her body keeps me warm
Im happy here
But this is where we used to live

Broke into the old apartment
Tore the phone out of the wall
Only memories, fading memories
Blending into dull tableaux

I want them back
I want them back

I like how the writer expresses the ambivalence of the narrator's feelings about the troublesome place he used to live. From the first line - where the narrator breaks into his old apartment - and then right into the third and fourth lines, we're aware that there's something going on here. Why break into anywhere, let alone a place where broken memories live? He tells us later - they may be bad but they're his memories, and his safe and sound world, though welcome, is something he's unsure about, though there's no reason why. Sure, it's nice now, but this is where we used to live. Something is not quite right here and it's wonderfully understated.