Jewel was cool....

...in 1997 with her hit Foolish Games.

as a 17 year old spending summers on Fernandina Beach, Florida, smoking green with all my guy friends...i didn't have many girl friends to speak of...the words to this song didn't mean much to me then. i was just into acoustic strums and female voices. but now, listening to it for, literally, the first time in 13 years the words ring especially poignant. there are a lot of Jewel jokes out there, and she hasn't had a whole lot of radio air since the late 90's...but when it comes to honesty and putting words together that are more than just teen angst, this one does it. and just as i'm sitting here thinking about all that has become my life in this past year, i hear this song.

You took your coat off and stood in the rain,
You're always crazy like that.
And I watched from my window,
Always felt I was outside looking in on you.
You're always the mysterious one with
Dark eyes and careless hair,
You were fashionably sensitive
But too cool to care.
You stood in my doorway, with nothing to say
Besides some comment on the weather.

Well in case you failed to notice,
In case you failed to see,
This is my heart bleeding before you,
This is me down on my knees, and...

These foolish games are tearing me apart,
And your thoughtless words are breaking my heart.
You're breaking my heart.
You're always brilliant in the morning,
Smoking your cigarettes and talking over coffee.
Your philosophies on art, Baroque moved you.
You loved Mozart and you'd speak of your loved ones
As I clumsily strummed my guitar.

You'd teach me of honest things
Things that were daring, things that were clean
Things that knew what an honest dollar did mean
So I hid my soiled hands behind my back
Somewhere along the line I must've gone off track with you

Well, excuse me, guess I've mistaken you for somebody else,
Somebody who gave a damn,
Somebody more like myself.

You took your coat off,
Stood in the rain,
You're always crazy like that.