When the cares of life are heavy and the world looks dark to me,
When board is high and funds are running low,
I can look back at the faces that I used to love to see--
The faces of the balmy long ago.
I can wander back along the brooks I loved when but a boy,
When I didn’t have to mend my shirts and sew
The buttons on I busted off, ah! those were days of Joy,
When I lived, a careless laddie, in the happy long ago.
Somehow, when my dinner’s heavy, then my heart gets heavy, too.
And I long to see the cooky jar again.
It isn’t any wonder that the world looks black and blue,
When you owe at least a half dozen men.
I am longing for the good old days when I could live care free,
And when I was hungry I could just tiptoe
Into the dark old pantry, and eat all that I could see,
And only get my britches fanned in the happy long ago.
Give me back the nice hot biscuit, give me back the fresh clean clothes,
Give me back the swimmin’ hole and all its joys,
Give me back the tenderness that a mother only knows
Makes the very life and soul of sturdy boys.
Give me back the apple-butter, and I’ll stir it till I die.
Give me back the places that I used to know.
Give me back the fresh fried sausage and the yellow pumpkin pie
That I used to do the chores for in the happy long ago.
The joy of being grown up has lost all its charm for me,
Since my clothes are growing threadbare down the seams,
And my Sunday hat needs darning, and my necktie seems to be
Drawing near the murmur of Elysian streams.
I am longing for the good old days, when life was new to me,
And the parties where I used to love to go,
The old-time apple cuttin’ and the jolly huskin’ bee,
Where I used to swing the lassies in the happy long ago.