Mary Chapin Carpenter
"Family Hands"
"Hometown Girl" Album

Intro: D, G/B, D, G/B, A7
 D                                    G
 Last Sunday we got in the car and we drove
        A7                            D            G/B   A7
 To the town you were raised in, your boyhood home
 D                            G
 The trees were just turning, up on the ridge
     A7                        D               G/B    A7
 And this was your valley when you were a kid
 D                                    G
 You showed me the railroad that your daddy worked on
       A7                              D                G/B    A7
 As we neared the old house where your granny lives on
 D                                        G
 She's nearing ninety years now, with her daughters by her side
     A7                                     D               Bm7
 Who tend the places in the heart where loneliness can hide


 Chorus

 Bm7           A9            G        A7       D
 Raised by the women who are stronger than you know
 Bm7         A9              Em7                   A7
 A patchwork quilt of memory only women could have sewn
 D                                          G
 The threads were stitched by family hands, protected from the moth
 Em7                      G            A7              D        G/B      A7
 By your mother... and her mother, the weavers of your cloth

 (2nd verse, same chords)
 Your grandmother owned a gun in 1932
 When times were bad just everywhere, you said she used it too
 And the life and times of everyone are traced inside their palms
 Her skin may be so weathered, but her grip is still so strong
 And I see your eyes belong to her and too your mama too
 A slice of Virginia sky, the clearest shade of blue

 Repeat Chorus

 (3rd verse, same chords)
 And a rich man you might never be, they'd love you just the same
 They've handed down so much to you besides your Christian name
 And the spoken word won't heal you like the laying on of hands
 Belonging to the ones who raised you to a man

 Repeat Chorus