• Home
  • Independent Voter News
  • Quizzes
  • Election Dissection
  • Sections
  • Events
  • Directory
  • About Us
  • Glossary
  • Opinion
  • Campaign Finance
  • Redistricting
  • Civic Ed
  • Voting
  • Fact Check
  • News
  • Analysis
  • Subscriptions
  • Log in
Leveraging Our Differences
  • news & opinion
    • Big Picture
      • Civic Ed
      • Ethics
      • Leadership
      • Leveraging big ideas
      • Media
    • Business & Democracy
      • Corporate Responsibility
      • Impact Investment
      • Innovation & Incubation
      • Small Businesses
      • Stakeholder Capitalism
    • Elections
      • Campaign Finance
      • Independent Voter News
      • Redistricting
      • Voting
    • Government
      • Balance of Power
      • Budgeting
      • Congress
      • Judicial
      • Local
      • State
      • White House
    • Justice
      • Accountability
      • Anti-corruption
      • Budget equity
    • Columns
      • Beyond Right and Left
      • Civic Soul
      • Congress at a Crossroads
      • Cross-Partisan Visions
      • Democracy Pie
      • Our Freedom
  • Pop Culture
      • American Heroes
      • Ask Joe
      • Celebrity News
      • Comedy
      • Dance, Theatre & Film
      • Diversity, Inclusion & Belonging
      • Faithful & Mindful Living
      • Music, Poetry & Arts
      • Sports
      • Technology
      • Your Take
      • American Heroes
      • Ask Joe
      • Celebrity News
      • Comedy
      • Dance, Theatre & Film
      • Diversity, Inclusion & Belonging
      • Faithful & Mindful Living
      • Music, Poetry & Arts
      • Sports
      • Technology
      • Your Take
  • events
  • About
      • Mission
      • Advisory Board
      • Staff
      • Contact Us
Sign Up
  1. Home>

Song: Up On The Roof

Michael Wayne
September 30, 2021
Song: Up On The Roof
Credit: Tetiana Lazunova/Getty Images

Wayne is the author of four books and a practitioner of acupuncture, Chinese medicine and integrative medicine. He is the director and producer of "On the Path to Strawberry Fields."

Carole King and Gerry Goffin wrote the song"Up On The Roof"back in 1962. The Drifters made it a big hit that same year.


Other people also sang it, including Julie Grant, Kenny Lynch, Little Eva, Jimmy Justice, Richard Anthony, Laura Nyro, Ike and Tina Turner, Kenny Rankin, the Nylons, the Cover Girls, and Tuck and Patti.

Bruce Springsteen and The E Street Band covered the song live in 1975 during their initial Born to Run tour. And James Taylor did a version that remains his last top 40 hit as a soloist.

I'm talking about the iconic "Up on the Roof," with lyrics that begin:

When this old world starts getting me down

And people are just too much for me to face

I climb way up to the top of the stairs

And all my cares just drift right into space

Right now for many of us, going up on the roof doesn't sound like a bad idea. This old world is getting a lot of us down, and for many people it is just too much to face. It would be a mighty fine feeling for all cares to just drift right off into space.

Sign up for The Fulcrum newsletter

I don't blame you for thinking that way. It's been a season of turbulence. We're seeing weather extremes — hurricanes, storms, severe heat, fires, floods, earthquakes and more — all within the context of the recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report saying we are nearing a tipping point on climate change.

We're seeing the ravages of war, as the U.S. ends its engagement in Afghanistan.

We're seeing a pandemic that seemingly has no end.

And we're seeing people at each other's throats, ready to seemingly kill one another over these and many other issues that divide us as Americans.

Can we find our way? Or is the only answer to go up on the roof?

We are warring among ourselves, and ultimately, we are warring with our own psyches, stuck in an endless cycle of anger, fear, hate, greed, selfishness, loneliness, fragmentation, trauma, abuse, addiction and more.

We need to love more, and be loved more. We need to be heard, and hear others. We need to care for others, and be cared for. We need to give more to others, without asking for anything in return. We need to appreciate our differences. And we need to slow down.

Furthermore, it can't be all about money and power over others. We must find the balance between materialism and the public good; i.e. the water, the air, the forests, and all other living and nonliving organisms. We can live in synergy with all these, if we want. Or we can choose the path of destruction.

The choice is ours. I think the answer is obvious, in that most of us want peace. And love.

There is a path forward. Through social cohesion, in which we come together as a people. We can move away from this dystopian nightmare and move towards a more just, compassionate, caring, sustainable, regenerative and wise future.

There is a way to get there. It will take political will, a re-thinking about how best to allocate our resources and, perhaps most importantly, a change in mindset — akin to a spiritual transformation. We need to go from a scarcity way of living to an abundance approach.

The famed economist John Maynard Keynes envisioned a world that was a post-scarcity society and wrote about it in his 1930 essay "Economic Possibilities for Our Grandchildren." He saw a coming age of abundance within 100 years. That means we've got nine years to bring Keynes' vision to fruition.

Man, do we have a lot of work ahead of us. But we can do it. I have faith.

Just remember, it's all about the Commons and the public good. By focusing on these, we can find our way.

To put it in easy- to-remember terms: share and care, collaborate and cooperate. And also, as the Ink Spots, Sam Cooke, Bing Crosby, Frank Sinatra and others sang, "The Best Things in Life Are Free." The songwriting team of Buddy DeSylva, Lew Brown and Ray Henderson wrote in 1927:

The moon belongs to everyone

The best things in life are free

The stars belong to everyone

They gleam there for you and for me

The flowers in spring, the robins that sing

The moonbeams that shine

They're yours, they're mine

And love can come to everyone

The best things in life are free

And love can come to everyone

The best things in life are free

In the interim, if you do feel like going up on the roof so that all your cares just drift off into space, be my guest. And when you come back down, be ready to have a renewed vigor for the transformation ahead.

We can do it.

Want to write
for The Fulcrum?

If you have something to say about ways to protect or repair our American democracy, we want to hear from you.

Submit
Get some Leverage Sign up for The Fulcrum Newsletter
Follow
Contributors

How a college freshman led the effort to honor titans of democracy reform

Jeremy Garson

Our poisonous age of absolutism

Jay Paterno

Re-imagining Title IX: An opportunity to flex our civic muscles

Lisa Kay Solomon

'Independent state legislature theory' is unconstitutional

Daniel O. Jamison

How afraid are we?

Debilyn Molineaux

Politicians certifying election results is risky and unnecessary

Kevin Johnson
latest News

How the anti-abortion movement shaped campaign finance law and paved the way for Trump

Amanda Becker, The 19th
24 June

Podcast: Journalist and political junkie Ken Rudin

Our Staff
24 June

A study in contrasts: Low-turnout runoffs vs. Alaska’s top-four, all-mail primary

David Meyers
23 June

Video: Team Democracy Urges Citizens to Sign SAFE Pledge

Our Staff
23 June

Podcast: Past, present, future

Our Staff
23 June

Video: America's vulnerable elections

Our Staff
22 June
Videos

Video: Memorial Day 2022

Our Staff

Video: Helping loved ones divided by politics

Our Staff

Video: What happened in Virginia?

Our Staff

Video: Infrastructure past, present, and future

Our Staff

Video: Beyond the headlines SCOTUS 2021 - 2022

Our Staff

Video: Should we even have a debt limit

Our Staff
Podcasts

Podcast: Did economists move the Democrats to the right?

Our Staff
02 May

Podcast: The future of depolarization

Our Staff
11 February

Podcast: Sore losers are bad for democracy

Our Staff
20 January

Deconstructed Podcast from IVN

Our Staff
08 November 2021
Recommended
Bridge Alliance intern Sachi Bajaj speaks at the June 12 Civvy Awards.

How a college freshman led the effort to honor titans of democracy reform

Leadership
abortion law historian Mary Ziegler

How the anti-abortion movement shaped campaign finance law and paved the way for Trump

Campaign Finance
Podcast: Journalist and political junkie Ken Rudin

Podcast: Journalist and political junkie Ken Rudin

Media
Abortion rights and anti-abortion protestors at the Supreme Court

Our poisonous age of absolutism

Big Picture
Virginia primary voter

A study in contrasts: Low-turnout runoffs vs. Alaska’s top-four, all-mail primary

Video: Team Democracy Urges Citizens to Sign SAFE Pledge

Video: Team Democracy Urges Citizens to Sign SAFE Pledge

Voting