Why Does My Heart Go On Beating?

I have wondered sometimes why I always gravitated to the sad, melancholy songs, stories, and movies?  My little sister, Linda, thought I was crazy when "Camelot" became my favorite movie.  She thought it was the dumbest, most aggravating story, but I loved watching King Arthur's eyes, and crying with him. 

I loved crying with sad songs, too.  It must have been around the time I was ten that I first heard "The End of the World", and it became my all time favorite.  Later I fell in love with Bobby Goldsboro's "Honey," which always made me cry, too, but for some reason "The End of the World" piqued my imagination and stuck in my brain.  For years I imagined myself as the heroin in different scenarios, always the stalwart, brave, good girl suffering tragedy with a stiff upper lip and brave fortitude to go on doing what was right, no matter what.  Oh, my day dreams were touching.  They used to make me cry, too. 

Years later, I wondered if perhaps I jinxed myself somehow, determining my own destiny by the stories I dwelled on in my childhood.  I don't think so.  Actually, I suspect I was drawn to the tragedies because a part of me that I couldn't remember knew the future role I had agreed to live up in heaven, before I came to this world, when Heavenly Father and I sat down and discussed what my role would be here on earth, and I told him I'd be glad to  play a tough part for a while, if it would help one of my brothers.  Funny how we always think we can do hard stuff, until we actually have to do it.  Then we wonder what made us so arrogant?

At any rate, I loved this song.  I remember standing in our kitchen, listening to it play on the radio.  Keith had talked Mom into listening to the radio and we were all standing around, enjoying the music although I really wondered why Keith liked some of the Beatles songs so much.  OK, "I Wanna Hold Your Hand" was pretty good, but "The Yellow Submarine?"  What was that all about?  Anyway, all of a sudden this song started to play, and it caught me.  The melody was haunting, Skeeter's voice was enchanting, but the words!  The words took hold of my mind and heart and soul and stayed with me from then until now.  Even today, as I began writing this blog and I remembered the song it started playing in my head and my heart beat a little faster.  For some reason, it does something to me, more than making me cry, more than making me smile in fond remembrance, more than taking me back to a time when I was young and innocent and wanted to be the heroin in a book.  Somehow, this song almost became the background music for my life.  Stupid, I know, but there you have it.  I loved this song.

THE END OF THE WORLD  

Why does the sun go on shining
Why does the sea rush to shore
Don't they know it's the end of the world
'Cause you don't love me any more

Why do the birds go on singing
Why do the stars glow above
Don't they know it's the end of the world
It ended when I lost your love

I wake up in the morning and I wonder
Why everything's the same as it was
I can't understand, no, I can't understand
How life goes on the way it does

Why does my heart go on beating
Why do these eyes of mine cry
Don't they know it's the end of the world
It ended when you said goodbye

Why does my heart go on beating
Why do these eyes of mine cry
Don't they know it's the end of the world
It ended when you said goodbye
---
"The End of the World" as written by Rob Crosby, Joanna Smith
and sung by Skeeter Davis