10 Songs I Sang in the Barrow County Jail

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I’ve spent the night in jail once. Which—given my long history of juvenile delinquency and general tendency to disregard most laws except those pertaining to capital offenses—is a small miracle.

So what heinous crime was I finally pinched for that night back in early ’08? Arson? Aiding & abetting? Assault & battery? Nope. Late at night, on the way from Athens, Ga., to Atlanta, I was pulled over and hauled in for “driving on a suspended registration.” It was news to me. I tried to explain to the Barrow County sheriff that I had no idea what he was talking about—“I’m innocent, officer! Listen, I was framed!”—but with a big ’ol shit-eatin’ grin, he tossed me in the back of his squad car anyway.

I never made it into population at the county jail—instead, I spent most of the night alone in a concrete holding cell that looked more like solitary in a psych ward than that little pen where Don Knotts used to keep people locked up on The Andy Griffith Show. By the time they let me make my one phone call, it was almost 3:30 a.m., and my only friend in the vicinity never picked up.

To pass the time until someone came to bail me out, I did the only thing I could think of—at the top of my lungs, I sang every prison song I could remember.

Say what you will about jail, but the acoustics there are fantastic—those high-ceilinged cells act like a studio-quality echo chamber. I don’t think my voice has ever sounded better.

Around lunch the next day, when I was released, I asked the guards about the quality of my mug shot (see above). “C’mon guys, on a scale of James Brown and Nick Nolte to Frank Sinatra, how’d I do?

They just shook their heads and stamped my release form.

Below is a list of the songs I belted in prison—almost all classic country, go figure.

1. Merle Haggard - “Mama Tried”

Lyrics I (mostly) remembered: “The first thing I remember knowing / Was a lonesome whistle blowing / And a young-un's dream of growing up to ride / On a freight train leaving town / Not knowing where I'm bound / No one could change my mind but Mama tried

“One and only rebel child / From a family meek and mild / My Mama seemed to know what lay in store / Despite all my Sunday learning / Toward the bad I kept on turning / 'Til Mama couldn't hold me anymore

“And I turned 21 in prison doing life without parole / No one could steer me right but Mama tried, Mama tried / Mama tried to raise me better but her pleading I denied / That leaves only me to blame 'cause Mama tried”