"Skyler"--Our Son Brad's Most Requested Song

Skyler, going on 8

Our Pittsburgh-based singer/songwriter son Brad wrote the following piece in 1991 about his chance meeting with an unforgettable 8-year-old at her father's art studio south of Charlottesville. The song he wrote about Skyler has remained a strong favorite among his fans over the past nearly three decades. He later reconnected with her as an adult, and the two are still in touch. 

Here's a link to a recording of the song that you can listen to while following along with the lyrics below: http://www.bradyoder.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/02-skyler.mp3

*************************************

One day I was debating between napping and a bike ride, and I don’t know how, but somehow found the strength to step outside, so I pedaled south of town about a mile until I passed a sign for Biscuit Run Sculpture, and I thought, “You just don’t ride right past a sign like that,” & so I turned onto the gravel lane, biked past the “No Trespassing” sign and kept on going till I came up to the sculptor’s big old farmhouse, where I asked to look around the yard at all the marble totem poles, and the metal dinosaurs.. There were some children playing there, and they told me that the “No Trespassing” sign was just for hunters, and did I want a puppy? and as I walked around the house into the sculptor’s work yard a young girl introduced herself, and she became my tour guide…

CHORUS: Skyler, fly…talk to total strangers like you’ve known them all your life, and Skyler, try… please try to stay that way a little while..

She said her name was Skyler, though her real first name is Megan but only doctors call her Megan, oh, and her aunt’s boyfriend Harry, too, “now Harry is a ‘younger man’,” said Skyler, and she laughed, as if she knew some people think there’s something funny about that, then she took me to the garden and she showed me all the statues there, and in the house were paintings on the walls and up and down the stairs... Sometimes she helps her parents out and makes 4 bucks an hour, half of that she gets to keep and half of it’s for college…“Sometimes,” she says, “it’s lonely, ‘cause there aren’t many neighbors” and when I finally had to go she told me, “See you later….alligator” 

CHORUS: Skyler, fly…talk to total strangers like you’ve known them all your life, and Skyler, try… please try to stay that way a little while..

This is a song I wrote for Megan Skyler Breeden, (who’s) named for a small Virginia town her father once got stone from…and on a day I almost slept through, she showed me so much beauty, that I thought I had to pay her back the only way I know how, so I hope that things are going well, I’ll bet that you know cursive now, I hope the puppies have all grown, I like the white one you named “Cow,” I know this song is getting long, and though it’s almost over, still, the chorus is my favorite part, and I think I’ll sing it one more time… 

CHORUS: Skyler, fly…talk to total strangers like you’ve known them all your life, and Skyler, try… please try to stay that way a little while..