Dixie Chicks: Travelin' Soldier Meaning
Song Released: 2002
Travelin' Soldier Lyrics
He was waiting for the bus in his army green
Sat down in a booth in a cafe there'
Gave his order to a girl with a bow in her hair
He's a little shy so she gives him a smile
And he said would you mind sittin' down for a...
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1TOP RATED
#1 top rated interpretation:This song is just so sad, my dad was in the war too young so it kinda hits home and well I kinda well ya know.........sos about that bad time in my life at the moment. Yeah it's cool and its real deep.
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2TOP RATED
#2 top rated interpretation:This song is my life. Kinda creepy cuz I just listened to this song for the first time. I'm waiting for my soldier who people say I'm too young for, but no one understands. we write letters and he's been to training in california. I'm in the marching band and play piccolo, all I'm hoping for is that it won't end like that.
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3TOP RATED
#3 top rated interpretation:The song is a ballad so pretty much tells the story itself. It's set sometime during the Vietnam war.
a guy just turned 18 is enlisted in the army and getting sent to an army camp and he's kinda nervous about it all. He doesn't really have anyone in his life to care about him and feels alone. He's sat in some cafe and asks this young girl working there if she would mind talking to him for a while so when she finishes work they go to the pier and sit and talk. He explains how he doesn't have anyone in his life and asks if he could write to her and she agrees.
He gets sent to an army camp in California then on to Vietnam and is writing her letters all the time. He tells her that he thinks he loves her and all the things that he's afraid of and how he thinks about her and when they met whenever he feels scared and it cheers him up. Then he tells her that he's not going to be able to write for a while but that she shouldn't worry.
The story then picks up at a football game in the girls town and after the anthem has been sung and the lords prayer said a man asks everyone to bow their heads as he reads a list of the soldiers killed in vietnam. Under one of the stands is the young girl crying because the soldier she fell in love with is one of the names read.
The chorus is basically talking about her crying and not thinking she'll ever be able to love anyone else again because she's still waiting for the soldier to come home. She doesn't want to believe that he's really never coming home so she waits for the letter telling her he's coming home safe and everyone is telling her she's too young to be spending the rest of her life waiting for the soldier to return and trying to convince her to move on but she refuses saying that she won't be alone once her soldier comes home. -
This song is set during the Vietnam war. There's this 18 year old guy who just got drafted into the army, but he's pretty nervous. He doesn't have anyone in his life who really cares for him. One day, he goes to this diner and he meets this waitress and he asks her to go talk to him for a while. They go and talk and the pier. He asks her if she would mind if he sent her letters and she says yes.
So they send each other letters while he is in California and then when he's in Vietnam. He tells her he loves her and that when it gets bad in war, he thinks of her.He also tells her he won't be able to write for a while, but to not worry.
Later, she's at a football game and she's playing in the band. After the anthem has been sung,a man asks everyone to bow their heads as he reads a list of the soldiers killed in Vietnam, and the boy's name is read off. The girl is now crying under the stands by herself. The chorus talks about how she'd never fall in love again and she'd never love anyone else. It also says that people told her the soldier was too old for her, but she was still waiting for him, because his letters said he was coming home. -
The whole song was written in third person except the chorus, where the artist writes "I cried" which is in first person, so I think the artist was putting themselves into the song. Also, the original song was written by a guy, so if the part of the song says "I cried", then I wonder what the relationship between him and the girl was. If he was an old boyfriend of hers, that would explain the part of the song that says "I bet you've got a boyfriend,but I don't care." Which is a line from the soldier. Still, the chorus sings "I cried, never gonna hold the hand of another guy" so that wouldn't make sense if that was the artist's part...
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i think she is supposed to be 18. however, he just turned 18 and it says the girl is young for him. she was probably 16. idk the age limit when they hire an waitress during those days. possibly 16. but we all know if a girl or boy is under 18 they are still a minor. 18 is already considered as an adult. but for real, their age is really close.
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i just have a question, it says that people say he was too old for her but he's only 2 days past 18?? Was she like 12 or something and that's why she wears a bow? But like, she's a waitress so... what? I mean if she were like 16, an 18 year old isn't too old, especially if he JUST turned 18?? anyone know how old she's supposed to be???
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When soldiers came back from Vietnam they were spit on. It was years and years before they were recognized, saluted and remembered publicly. If the girl was working as a waitress when he left,she was probably not in the school band. Additionally the government sent a letter or a telegram saying that a soldier died and was "coming home" to be buried. I feel like it was his daughter that he never knew about and he was forgotten because he died before he ever grew up, ever had a chance to make a mark on the little town
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The line "nobody really cared but a pretty little girl with a bow in her hair" is obvious - the soldier told her that he had no one to write to (which means no one cares about him) therefore, the piccolo player is the girl with the bow in her hair, and her soldier, unfortunately, did die.
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i think that what is special about this song is that you can kindof interperate this song however you want- you can think that the girl is the picalo player and shes cring because of the death of her love, or you could think that the picalo player is some kid from the marching band who maybe had a sibling or cousin die and then a random girl came to comfort them. i prefer to think that the soilder DID come home because it makes the song more calming. Either way, i love the song and it makes me cry every time.
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I love the song but at the end of the video it shows them together. So is he alive or not because it also showed her crying at his casket on the tarmac. And the lyrics make it sound as if he had died.
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This is a touching song. It reminds me of when I was a teen, and my boy-friend didn't come home from the Army, and stopped writing, and nobody knew why, until I found out he had been killed. I cry everytime I hear it.
The interpretations are so true, I don't feel there's really anything I can add to them. -
my interpretation? why was she at the football game? bc she’s the piccalo player in the marching band. when one name was read nobody cared but her. she’s referred to “the pretty little girl w the bow in her hair” again bc that who she was introduced as at the beginning.
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Come on people. The soldier does die. And just like the soldier had no one to care for him when he was alive except the girl, the piccolo player-No one mourns him in his death but the girl. She almost the only person that will ever remember he lived. Its haunting really. Wrap yourself up in those emotions.
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I am very confused, I see it as the piccolo player had a loved one announced then her soldiers name came up, unfortunately I am lost after that, hence why I am on this feed, either he really is dead,and she is in denial, he is dead and she is not in denial, or she thinks he is dead but he comes home after all, alive and well......?
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Well let me tell my meaning of the song I had cousin and who died 15yrs ago and I truthfully did have someone in the marines that I fell in love with and stuff and he died so this song has to me than some people think.
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I have watched many videos that people make of this song and some of the videos show that he did die and other videos don't.
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Maybe at the end, the girl with the bow in her hair is actually the baby of the soldier and the girl....???
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