Love at the Five and Dime by Nanci Griffith

Nanci Griffith was a masterful folk and country singer and storyteller. Not familiar with her music? Start out with “Love at the Five and Dime.”

On August 14, I was startled to learn that Nanci Griffith had died a day earlier. She was 68. So young. I also felt the heart heaviness that comes when we learn an old friend is gone, someone we haven’t seen in a long while, perhaps someone we remember from our youth.

I hadn’t listened to her music in years. Suddenly I was filled with longing.

Nanci sang from the heart, her voice pure and clear, her every word, true. I’m not a big fan of folk music. Or country music. Yet back in the day, I played her CDs until they got scuffed and scratched. The aching purity of her voice and the lovely stories she told in song. I was hooked.

I think in human stories, the stories filled with micro disruptions and destabilized status quos, developmental arcs and evolutionary flows.

Twice I saw Nanci Griffith in concert, one of those times at the Birchmere in Alexandria, Virginia. It was during a tough period in my life, the concert not all that long after my fiancé had died of cancer. I won’t say that her music saved me. I won’t say she did either. But during tough periods we fumble about, hoping to grasp onto anything we can. Friends. Music venues. Live music. Events on the calendar that we might — God willing — actually look forward to.

I remember the seat at the Birchmere and what felt like a far distance from the stage, my friend LuAnne beside me. I remember feeling grateful that I had the chance to see her live. That I had the chance to hear her play.

Try to listen to “Listen to the Radio” without feeling even a bit happier. It’s nearly impossible to do.

Other Nanci Griffith standouts: “Gulf Coast Highway” (with Willie Nelson), “Trouble in the Fields,” “It’s a Hard Life Wherever You Go,”, and “Speed of the Sound of Loneliness” (written by John Prine).

But the song I think of most when I think of Nanci Griffith is “Love at the Five and Dime.”

Nanci Griffith’s songs have always had me riveted. Give “Love at the Five and Dime” a listen. I think you’ll be riveted, too.

“Love at the Five and Dime” Lyrics