Apron Strings

If you saw and loved the movie She's Having a Baby way back in the early '90s or late '80s when it was released, then you probably love the soundtrack as well.

After searching in vain for the out of print collection for a couple of years, I finally got a copy last night. Jeremy and his wife Teresa came to Scott's show with their little cutie Nathan last night and J. brought me a copy of the soundtrack plus a few covers/remixes of songs on the album. Very cool.

As always, one song stood out among the others and tugged at my heartstrings, bringing tears to my eyes. It's always the same one, although I realize that over the years the reasons the song touches me so deeply have changed.

Here are the lyrics:


Apron strings
Hanging empty
Crazy things
My body tells me
I want someone to tie to my lonely
Apron strings

Apron strings
Waiting for you
Pretty things
That i could call you
I want someone to tie to my lonely
Apron strings

He'd look just like me when I was young
And I wonder as the days unwind
Will he have your eyes or mine
Then i wake up to my
Apron strings
Cold and lonely
For time brings
Thoughts that only
Will be quiet when someone clings to my
Apron strings

And i'll be perfect in my own way
When you cry i'll be there
I'll sing to you and comb your hair
All your troubles i will share

For apron strings
Can be used for other things
Than what they're meant for
And you'd be happy wrapped in my
Apron strings

I don't want to talk about the reasons that song moved me when I was younger; they've passed away, changed, been forgotten about. Now, last night, as I played the song over and over again about four times on the drive home, always crying at the lines "and I'll be perfect in my own way/When you cry I'll be there/I'll sing to you and comb your hair/All your troubles I will share," all I can think about his how happy I am now to have someone, two someones, clinging to my apron strings, but how much happier I am to see my friends – many of them – who have struggled to get pregnant, stay pregnant, adopt, and become the parents they knew they were meant to be, finally hold their own children and have them cling not only to their apron strings, but to heartstrings as well.