It wasn’t long after writing “One Foot In The Door” that I wrote “Mary On My Mind”. The title states the obvious. I had fallen hard, for sure.
As November was slipping away and Mary and I had gone on a couple of dates, I was seriously considering going to Sarasota for the Thanksgiving break. At that time, we got the entire week of Thanksgiving off of school. I knew it would be sunny and warm in southwest Florida. Though I would hate to miss Thanksgiving meals with my family, I thought it would be a fun excursion to visit the kids from the youth group and all of the friends I had made at Faith Baptist Church.
I ended up not going on the trip. Knowing it would eat up two whole days of my break just driving down and back soured me on the idea. But, in considering going on the trip, it spurred the idea for the song. Now, the reality is that Mary and I weren’t going to see other over the break anyway. Even still, she was on my mind and most certainly would have been if I was in Sarasota instead of Danville and North Carolina.
The irony is that I would live this song out in about 18 months of time. I was ahead of Mary by one year in college. As I mentioned in the post for “From Danville To Blacksburg”, I met Gary Downing at Faith Baptist Church during my summer internship. Gary would recruit me to the Professional Engineer Development Program with Sarasota County Public Works two years later, my first job out of college. In June of 2004, I moved to Sarasota while Mary stayed behind to finish her undergraduate degree in 2005 and her master’s degree in 2006, two months before we got married. When I was considering the position in the spring of 2004, I asked Mary if she’d be willing to move to Florida when she finished school. We had been together for over a year at that point. And though we hadn’t said it out loud, I think we both knew how we felt and where we believed the relationship was headed. From my vantage point, I didn’t want to spend two years working and growing in a career with Sarasota County only to have to move back to North Carolina or Virginia. Me accepting the job in Florida was conditioned on Mary wanting to live there too. She was enthusiastic about the potential, so I accepted the job.
It was certainly the best thing for my future as the experiences in the Professional Engineer Development Program have served as a strong foundation for my career in public works. But that also meant that I spent two long years away from Mary. We wrote letters, we talked on the phone, she came to visit me over the summer, and I made a few surprise trips up to see her. But there were many nights where I would play and sing this song in my apartment, living out the words I had written so innocently in the first couple of weeks of our relationship – that it was sunny and warm in Sarasota, and I had Mary on my mind.
Looking back now for these posts, it’s remarkable how many songs I wrote the few days surrounding leaving Blacksburg for fall break in 2002. I already noted that “I Want To Know You” and “Tell Carolina I Said Hello”. were written then as well. There were flurries of snow, and it was windy and chilly as I headed up I-81 toward Roanoke. It was a stark contrast to what I imagined the weather in Sarasota was like at the same time as I drove that highway through the Blue Ridge Mountains. It might have come up a rain shower, and it was probably at least in the 70’s. I would discover that was pretty accurate my first year living in Sarasota. I remember I played golf in shorts, and it was in the 80’s on New Year’s Eve that first year – a very different climate for sure!
Like “One Foot In The Door”, the guitar part on “Mary On My Mind” was always disappointing to me. For this song, it was the combination of the sound of the Takamine and my poor playing. As time went on and I became a better guitarist, this song came into form. I’ve included the newer version of this song from the recordings I did for Mary several years ago with this post as well. I think it sounds the way I always wanted this song to sound. Let me know what you think about the story and the new recording of “Mary On My Mind”!
