I was born in '37, a sharecropper's son Out on the great south plains There in the suburbs of a dryland cotton patch In the middle of a west Texas rain And for all of you folks out there in radioland who don't know what a West Texas rain is, Well that's what's commonly known as a sandstorm Remember that, you'll need it later I guess times were hard but livin' was easy We always found a way to survive Fried chicken and gravy and an old tune off the guitar Was enough to keep a country boy alive And on Saturday afternoons it was Lester Pruitt's "The Picture Show" On Saturday's nights is the Grand Ol' Uproar from Nashville Tennessee, take it away boys Lookin' back now and thinkin' it over Life was like an old country song My mama taught me the melody and daddy taught me the chords I made the words up on my own And sometimes it didn't rhyme, but they always had a reason, Even if it was unbeknownst to no one but myself I guess all that west Texas sand in my crawl, that's what make me so mean I'd bet I was the only boy ever expelled from Sunday school Lover, fighter, wild-horse rider, and purty dern good windmill maker Look out world, here I come