I was waltzing with my darlin'
To the
Tennessee waltz
When an old friend I happened to see I
introduced him to my loved one
And while they were waltzing,
my friend stole my sweetheart from me.
I remember the night and the
Tennessee woods.
I know just how much I have loved.
I lost my little darlin' the night
they were playin'
The beautiful
Tennessee
Waltz
I remember the night and the
Tennessee
Waltz
I know just how much I have lost.
I lost my little darling the night
they were playing
in the beautiful
Ten nessee walkway.
Thank you.
Thank you very much.
As we said a while ago, this is the fourth time in
five years that I have been here.
I feel that I must say something
of which I deeply believe.
One of the nicest things that has happened to me
in meeting the thousands and thousands
of people that I have from your state is that I have be
come very closely associated with
one of the finest groups of men I've ever known,
and that's your
Indiana
State
Police, who have been so great
to us.
Give them a hand!
I have never known a finer group of gentlemen an
d have been so much help to us.
I know we've been a lot of bother to them, but they've
grinned and barred, and they've
just been great to us.
This one trooper has been with us every
trip that we've been here.
Actually his folks come from
back in my part of the country.
I just happen to think of this.
I don't know if he knows I know it,
but if he knows I know it, he hopes I've forgotten
it.
I'll bet that.
I'll never forget years ago when we were young bucks,
and that was years ago.
Back there a beautiful showgirl from
California came back to our part
of the country for a
vacation.
She wanted to be there in the hills where
it was quiet and walk through the fields
and the woods and the meadows
and the mud.
So she came back to our part of the
country
and got a room in one of those big old
farmhouses.
She was having a wonderful time, an
d one hot
Saturday afternoon—ooh,
it was hot !—she took a walk down through that patch of woods
that goes down the back of our
place there.
And you don't walk too far through
that
patch of woods
till you come to the river."
She got there on the riverbank,
and oh, boy,
did that look cool.
And she sure was hot, boys.
And she was in the woods, she was
by herself, and it is hot."
She was in the woods and by herself,
and she sure didn't want to go swimming.
So she went into swimming,
because it was in the woods and she was by herself.
She put her clothes there on a rock
and stacked them up there.
She went into the river and,
oh, did that feel good, oh, boy!
I don't suppose that young
Walker boy had been down
through that patch of woods in six
months for no reason at all.
Here he comes,
bigfooting down through there that day.
He got down on the bank of the river and
saw a lady's clothes ly ing there on a rock.
He looked out into the water, and fortunately
our heroine is in deep enough water.
Of course, his eyes bugged out
like a stomped -on toad frog.
He sat right down on the rock.
She saw him.
She was out in the water.
She said,
Well, he'll get up and go away in a few minutes,
and I'll get out and get dressed
and go back to the house.
Not that boy!
Finally, it had gotten later,
and she was getting a little cold, and she said,
Young
man, would you mind getting up and going away? I have to
come out and get dressed and go
to the house."
He just sat there and looked at her.
She would beg him, and he would sit,
and she would move around in the
river to try to keep warm.
It was getting late.
Her foot hit something in the bottom of the river that
just didn't feel like the bottom
of the river.
It was something different.
She went down under the
water and got a hold
of it.
She felt of it and knew it
was a big old country dishpan.
Somebody had thrown it
away that didn't want it.
It great big thing.
So she got it up in front of her and covered herself up pretty good,
and she comes storming
out of that water up to him and said,
Young man, do you know what I think?
He said,
Yes, ma 'am.
I bet you think there's a
bottom in that dishpan.
Well, these home folks
have fun, don't they?
When I was here in 1955, the first trip I made here,
we did a song, the first time I
had ever done it publicly,
even before I ever recorded it.
So having done it here, I must give you folk credit for the whole mess,
which I'm certainly
glad.
And here we're back for our fourth time at the same
place where this song first got
Let's start,
and we hope you haven't forgotten it yet.
Did you get it, honey?
All right.
