From the recording Everything Else Was Noise
A Little Hard To Swaller
“A Little Hard To Swaller” is about looking back on a painful chapter of life and realizing that memory does not always tell the same story from every side.
This song does not pretend everything was done perfectly. It leaves room for regret, missed moments, hard circumstances, and the truth that a young man can love deeply and still fall short in ways that hurt. But it also speaks to the ache of hearing the past told in a way that feels only half true — close enough to hurt, but not complete enough to carry the whole weight of what really happened.
At its heart, this song is about standing between two versions of your life. One version remembers absence. Another remembers effort, sacrifice, love, and trying to do right with what you had at the time.
“A Little Hard To Swaller” is not about denying anyone else’s pain. It is about holding on to your own truth, even when the past comes back complicated, unfinished, and hard to swallow.
— Lane Alan Dumser
Lyrics
Thirty years can bend a picture
Till the frame don’t fit the wall
One remembers empty spaces
One remembers I tried through it all
I won’t say I never missed things
I won’t claim I got it right
But I loved ’em in the middle
Of a young man’s harder life
That’s a little hard to swaller
When the past comes back half right
When it tells just enough truth
To keep me up at night
I did right, or near as I could
With the wishin’ burnin’ through
When the lie sounds so close to the wishin’
That’s a little hard to swaller
One says I wasn’t there
One knows how hard I tried
And I’m standin’ in the middle
Of two versions of my life
I won’t dress it up all pretty
Put lipstick on a pig
I won’t paint myself as clean
But I know the road I walked back then
And what that walk cost me
I won’t call that pain a liar
But I can’t call that story mine
Love shows up in actions
Love shows up in deeds
Empty words don’t carry far
Without some traction underneath
That’s a little hard to swaller
When the past comes back half right
When it tells just enough truth
To keep me up at night
I did right, or near as I could
With the wishin’ burnin’ through what I knew I should
When the lie sounds so close to the wishin’
That’s a little hard to swaller