Got out of prison back in '86 and I found a wife

Walked the clean and narrow

Just tryin' to stay out and stay alive

Got a job at the rendering plant, it ain't gonna make me rich

In the darkness before dinner comes

Sometimes I can feel the itch

I got a cold mind to go tripping 'cross that thin line

I'm sick of doin' straight time



My uncle's at the evenin' table, makes his living runnin' hot cars

Slips me a hundred dollar bill says

"Charlie you best remember who your friends are."

Got a cold mind to go tripping 'cross that thin line

I ain't makin' straight time



Eight years in it feels like you're gonna die

But you get used to anything

Sooner or later it just becomes your life



Kitchen floor in the evening tossin' my little babies high

Mary's smiling but she's watching me out of the corner of her eye

Seems you can't get any more than half free

I step out onto the front porch and suck the cold air deep inside of me

Got a cold mind to go tripping 'cross that thin line

I'm sick of doin' straight time



In the basement huntin' gun and a hacksaw

Sip a beer and thirteen inches of barrel drop to the floor



Come home in the evening, can't get the smell from my hands

Lay my head down on the pillow

And go driftin' off into foreign lands