‘500 Miles’ - Peter, Paul and Mary

If you’ve been anywhere near TikTok, you would’ve heard a 15 second snippet of ‘500 Miles’ by Peter, Paul and Mary; a song predating my dad’s birth that has somehow wiggled its way into the current internet-sphere.

In it’s heart, this melodic folk tune - written by Hedy West - is a depiction of departure and loneliness.

“If you miss the train I'm on, you will know that I am gone
You can hear the whistle blow a hundred miles”

The story is inherently simplistic, with repeated verses and a persistent melody that occupies the whole 2 minutes and 42 seconds, concerning a deflated individual disembarking from their home and travelling far far away. The story uses these repetitions to mimic the physical distance growing and stretching as the train pulls away from the station and traverses through its long journey.

My favourite section of this semi-viral clip would have to be the chorus/refrain:

“Lord, I'm one, Lord, I'm two, Lord, I'm three, Lord, I'm four
Lord, I'm 500 miles from my home”

I am not a religious woman, but these exclamations to a higher figure settled somewhere deep in my stomach like a bad stomach bug that makes you feel like you’re going to vomit but are too lazy to get up out of bed and test the theory.

To me, it feels so close to longing that it somehow misses the mark.

To me, it feels like disbelief. The overwhelming doubt that this is real, that the life that they know is disappearing behind the fumes exiting like coughing breaths from the chimney up above. When the singer says ‘Lord’, it is not an address to the fictitious figure lingering above the clouds, but a personification of that thought. The thought that everything has changed and nothing will be the same again.

When I took the first coach road up to University, a grueling 12 hour ride with screaming children and broken over-head fans, my heart paused at bridge over River Avon.

The sun was beginning to rise, with each cloud carrying a subtle hue of orange and pink, and cliff sides were jagged and sharp under the newly awakening sun. I think I can remember it so thoroughly because that was the farthest I had ever gone by myself.

I felt it then. The disbelief and shock that with each turn of the wheel I was one metre closer to the prospect of something new, leaving my life before in the echo of a whistle blow.

I’m not a ‘home-sick’ person.

I choose to stay up here in the midlands, far away, to work and keep myself busy. I brand it as cost-effective; that my family is not close enough to warrant an appearance outside of the obligatory summer return. That these freedoms that I have grown accustomed to are a necessity and a vital part of my person, and going home is a surrender of the one thing I think I know: relying on the comfort of others is a luxury reserved to childhood ignorance and naivety.

Yet, last night, in the quiet of my deserted flat after a long shift pouring pints and chatting to the regulars that always remain when others do not, all I craved was the hug of my mum.

I could almost imagine phantom limbs reaching out and tucking my head under hers in a warm embrace, one hand lingering behind to find its home stroking the back of my messy hair. And, if I closed my eyes long enough I could smell the remnants of that mornings burst of Sure deodorant.

Coming to profound revelations is not in my character - nor is recognising my short-fallings and insecurities, but one thought did occur:

Even though time and distance can change the soul, it can not shape the heart.

In every place, and every time, I will still befall to my worst trait: the need to escape and start again.

University Emily still runs and pushes people away until the reluctancy to return finds a way to stick. I still don’t let people get close enough to see the scarred tissue that batters my heart like a protective shield, hiding the ugly parts of my being that I want to believe never existed.

I think of the warm embrace that I chose to deprive myself of with the passing of each holiday, and justify every excuse that sits like a bad taste on the tip of my tongue.

Perhaps it is a punishment. Perhaps I chose to get on the coach every time so that I may have more time to grow to be self-sufficient and have faith in the person I will come to present on my homecoming, so that they will not turn me away at the door to start again somewhere unknown.

Perhaps, even if this song is not about going home, but running far away, it is still a love song for what is being left behind. It is still a love letter to the people who listen as the train pulls away and choose to root their feet firmly in the soil. It is a promise to return a-new, someone - something - to be proud of.

Lord, I’m one, Lord I’m two, Lord I’m three, Lord I’m four,

Lord, I’m 205 miles away from my home.

- Em