I met my girlfriend for the first time at an Okkervil River show. I had heard of them, but had never really listened to them (and when I did, years ago, it didn't leave much of an impression on me). My girlfriend, then just a girl curious as to whether my demeanor on the phone could be matched by my demeanor in reality, had never heard them at all. They impressed us both, though on later listens only two songs of theirs would end up in my collection, and this is one of them.

I'm sure we've all loved stones (whether it be an inaccessible guy or gal, or a dead one, as people on SongMeanings postulate), and equally sure that we've all loved people who have been in love with stones. Will Sheff--a "poet and a student of literature" according to a commenter on SongMeanings--crafts something slow and beautiful, but not necessarily sad, about the dilemma of such a situation, and then carries it into the realm of fantasy only to really nail down the hopelessness of the situation.

Good stuff. I am glad that while Will Sheff was singing the words--all skinny, sweaty, and suited--to a song that summed up quite a few of my relationships (you can hold me and cry with me later if you so choose), I was putting my arms around someone who wasn't a stone, who wasn't in love with a stone, for the first time.