What Good Is This?

Not quite smart enough.

from the album From a Ways Down the Road

This song was written out of frustration with how little progress I’ve actually made figuring out life’s Big Questions. I know, shocker, right?

Every time I think I’m on the brink of some kind of wisdom, it’s as if I’m sneaking up to the edge of understanding when my foot gets tangled in a vine or something and I can only strain forward, squinting helplessly at the empty space before me.

And yet I keep on trying. How did Einstein define insanity again?

(My daughter Zoë Johnson-Berman helped out with handclaps on this one.)

What good is this
All this crap I’ve figured out
It doesn’t change a thing
That it’s all about

I try and try
To do the best with what I’ve got
I maybe get a glimpse
But then maybe not

Whatever I do
It’s the same brick wall
Wherever I go
It’s another question
Nothing brings me closer
To the answers I’ve been seeking
It’s enough to make a guy give up
It’s enough to make a guy give up

Tryna understand
What it means to be alive
What it means to die
And I just don’t get it
Tryna find some peace
Before the sand runs out
Or it makes me crazy
Either one

I knock on the door
And the lock lets go
I open it wide
And I step right through it
What the hell I’m right back
Where I started on the outside
It’s enough to make a guy give up
It’s enough to make a guy give up

What good this is?
All the stuff I think I know
Just a bunch of hints
Not a lot to show

What good is this?
No matter what I say
Guess I’ll be flying blind
Like any other day

What good is this?
What good is this?
What good is this?
What good is this?