Sometimes when the world seems to have reached a new level of desperation, I’m comforted by certain remembrances of my childhood. (I realize I’m fortunate in having those memories.)

When I was a small child, country music (maybe you call it folk music or something else) was a part of my life. I lived in a working class eastern suburb of Nashville, Tennessee. At the time, this kind of music was mostly followed by that same American kind of working class. The Grand Ole Opry was in Nashville’s Ryman Auditorium on Saturday nights in downtown Nashville, a long time before its modern version in the Opryland amusement park. I attended this older version a few times, often to take visiting kinfolk, hungry for the South they had left for jobs on the West Coast.

A few of the stars on the Opry lived in our modest neighborhood, at least one within walking distance of our house. We thought of country music as a part of our ordinary culture.

So when the world’s and this nation’s troubles seem to overwhelm, I can sometimes find comfort in listening to that country music, either in older or newer versions.

Take Kris Kristofferson’s Why Me, Lord? One version is copied below. (Apologies if it’s preceded by an advertisement I couldn’t take out.) (Also that you may need earphones.