Union Maid

Two years ago this week, my father died. In his last years, when I was at his house in the morning, I’d play songs like this on the banjo for his listening pleasure, the brighter notes of black coffee mingling with the always slightly-out-of-tune twang, some old Woody Guthrie or Pete Seeger accompanying his New York Times, as if in ironic, melodic counterpoint. Dad called Seeger “Party Line Pete”, and was more of a Dylan man.