“Castle On The Hill” by Ed Sheeran
When I was six years old I broke my leg
I was running from my brother and his friends
And tasted the sweet perfume of the
Mountain grass I rolled down
I was younger then
Take me back to when
I found my heart and broke it here
Made friends and lost them through the years
And I’ve not seen the roaring fields in so long
I know I’ve grown
I can’t wait to go home
I’m on my way
Driving at 90 down those
Country lanes
Singing to “Tiny Dancer”
And I miss the way you make me feel, it’s real
We watched the sunset
Over the castle on the hill
Fifteen years old and smoking hand-rolled cigarettes
Running from the law to the backfields
And getting drunk with my friends
Had my first kiss on a Friday night
I don’t reckon I did it right
I was younger then
Take me back to when
We found weekend jobs, when we got paid
We’d buy cheap spirits and drink them straight
Me and my friends have not thrown up in so long
Oh, how we’ve grown
I can’t wait to go home
I’m on my way
Driving at 90 down those
Country lanes
Singing to “Tiny Dancer”
And I miss the way you make me feel, it’s real
We watched the sunset
Over the castle on the hill
Over the castle on the hill
Over the castle on the hill
One friend left to sell clothes
One works down by the coast
One had two kids but lives alone
One’s brother overdosed
One’s already on his second wife
One’s just barely getting by
But these people raised me
And I can’t wait to go home.
And I’m on my way
I still remember these old country lanes
When we did not know the answers
And I miss the way you make me feel, it’s real
We watched the sunset
Over the castle on the hill
Over the castle on the hill
Over the castle on the hill
Dear God, well, this song is most certainly not scripture, but it taps into an emotion within me that I’d like to explore with you this morning.
I was fortunate to have had a great group of friends, especially my senior year in high school. We would spend all weekend together. My memories are that at least one night of the weekend we would go to someone’s house and stay up most of the night and well into the early hours of the morning laughing, watching movies and playing games. Unlike Ed Sheeran’s depiction in this song, we didn’t drink or smoke, but I think we got the same emotional constructs for ourselves that Ed and his friends got from each other.
High school is an interesting mixture of responsibilities and irresponsibility. For most of us, we have the responsibilities of school, preparing for college, chores around the house and maybe an outside job, but we still don’t have to worry about where our next meal is coming from and how we will pay our rent/house payment (notice I said, “most,” because I know there are tragically too many youth who have to worry about these things). And we have a choice as we are making friends. We can identify our values and then find people who fit those values (I think that’s what I did) or we can identify people with whom we want to be friends and then adopt their values.
In my case, there are little phrases of this song that hit me–well, I just looked back and that won’t work. The whole thing hits me. My parents could only do so much to influence me. They set the standards within which I had to perform (grades, work, chores, college applications, etc.), but, in retrospect, I can say that at one level they had a tremendous influence on who I became (taking me to church), but on another level how little of it had to do with them.
So let’s see how I would lay out his last “where are they now” section:
- One got married young and had several children. She is a college professor
- One survived breast cancer
- One has had several health struggles for her and her husband
- One is a missionary in Thailand
- At least a couple have had children with special needs
- One is gay and has been rejected by some of the group
- Several are on second marriages (there might even be a third in there somewhere)
- One lost a son to suicide
As for me, my life has been a surprise to me. I’m happily married for 26 years, but we’ve had our struggles. My career has seen ups and downs. And I’ve seen ups and downs in my relationship with you. I guess one of the reasons this song speaks to me so much is that it takes me back to a part of my mind where I am young, naïve, idealistic, judgmental, ignorantly confident, hormonal, and scared. I think about the exuberance of youth and how, now that I’m older, I can spot it in a young person. I always have two thoughts: 1.) Good for you and 2.) you’ll probably experience pain that will take that away.
One thing I remember telling both my daughter and my son when they were in high school is that they will be surprised at how they drift apart from their friends. At that stage in life, it seems like those friends are your whole world and you’ll never lose what you have, but we all go off and touch different parts of the world you have for us. In Ed Sheeran’s case, he has probably seen more of the world through his career than 99% of the rest of us. But he can’t wait to go home. I’ll admit, the first time I heard this song and the part at the end about where everyone is now, I wondered if it’s awkward for him to go back as such a financial and famous success. Did that change his relationships with them irreparably?
Father, while it’s true that that group my senior year, as well as previous best friends throughout my school years helped to raise me, what I didn’t understand at the time is that, if I stayed in pursuit of you, you would be the one who would continue to raise me, even until this day. You are shaping me and molding me. And you have sometimes used me to encourage one of these friends, and you’ve continued to use them to encourage me. Thank you for how you’ve built me. Thank you for helping me to get something positive, to this very day, from those memories and songs like this. But thank you also that you’ve continued to guide me to new scenes beyond the castle on the hill.
In Jesus’ name I pray,
Amen
Emails to God 