Thank goodness I'm not alone! When I heard Oh What A Lonely Boy a year or two ago for the first time in a long time, I blinked a bit and thought, I must have misheard that - what else went wrong in his life? Answer, on checking the lyrics - nothing at all. What a brat.
(Made much, much worse by finding out via the internet that the singer/songwriter was born in 1951 and has a sister born in 1953. He says it's not autobiographical. Hmmm. I wonder what his family made of it.)
ANDREW GOLD
"Lonely Boy"
He was born on a summer day, 1951
And with the slap of a hand
He had landed as an only son
His mother and father said "what a lovely boy"
We'll teach him what we learned
Ah yes, just what we learned
We'll dress him up warmly and
We'll send him to school
It'll teach him how to fight
To be nobody's fool
Oh, oh, what a lonely boy
Oh, what a lonely boy
Oh, what a lonely boy
In the summer of '53 his mother
Brought him a sister
But she told him "we must attend to her needs"
"She's so much younger than you"
Well, he ran down the hall and he cried
Oh, how could his parents have lied
When they said he was an only son
He thought he was the only one
Oh, oh, what a lonely boy
Oh, what a lonely boy
Oh, what a lonely boy
[Instrumental Interlude]
He left home on a winter day, 1969
And he hoped to find all the love
He had lost in that earlier time
Well, his sister grew up
And she married a man
He gave her a son
Ah yes, a lovely son
They dressed him up warmly
They sent him to school
It taught him how to fight
To be nobody's fool
Oh, oh, what a lonely boy
Oh, what a lonely boy
Oh, what a lonely boy