Song 351: This week on the playlist you’ll find (I Heard That) Lonesome Whistle by Hank Williams, written by Hank Williams and Jimmie Davis. Before the Beatles rocked my world, I knew nothing about RnR, but I heard plenty of country music on the family summer visits to Ohio relatives, so I got to know Hank Williams quite well. On those hot summer nights when we could hear the B & O railroad crews switching freight cars just a couple of blocks away, this cut seemed to fit the moment better than any other, and I soon learned it well enough to sing along. After only 2 or 3 nights of hearing the local freight car switching moves, I quickly realized that no matter how loud they became, they rarely if ever interrupted my sleep or kept me awake, but rather, I found those sounds relaxing enough to put me to sleep, just as the sound of lonesome whistles on the train line that ran nearby the family home would do. Even though at the time, I too was Just a kid acting smart, I didn’t have a darlin’s heart to break, and I guess I was too young to know how that might feel, but Hank’s song seemed to echo in my soul, as if I had always known it, probably because I had been hearing that lonesome whistle since before I could even walk or talk.
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