Another Sesame Street song, performed by my sort-of namesake, Grover. Like it says on my homenode, I identify with this fuzzy blue monster in weird ways, and when I first wrote this little ditty up, I had been in Eugene, Oregon for a little less than two months, so it was still very much a new place where I didn't really know anyone, which made this the appropriate song to sing to myself, sometimes for hours at a time. I don't think I'm alone in reading a kind of desperate, manic optimism in Grover's happy-go-lucky attitude; there's always an edge of need to the eagerness with which he proclaims himself "your old pal", and I was certainly spending enough time being unemployed and lonely to identify with that hint of despair, especially when the furry blue monster's optimism seemed almost foreign to me. Fortunately, life is much better (and in particular less lonely) now, but this is still a really cute song, albeit in a typically near-pathetic Grover way. Although he's depicted as haviing a mental age of somewhere between four and six, this piece is suitable for children of all ages, which is what makes it a Sesame Street classic.
Grover, of course, is performed by Frank Oz; the version of this song in my music collection is on Sesame Street Platinum, a greatest hits album of "all time favorites."
Lyrics
What do I do when I'm alone?
Well, sometimes I sing a little song:
La, la-la-la, la, la—
That is the song I sing.
(Spoken:) It's a nice song.
(Sung:) What do I do when I'm alone?
Well, sometimes I do a little dance:
I jump and I hop, hop hop—
That is my little dance
And sometimes when I am all alone
I pretend that I can fly
And I touch all the clouds
And I wave to the birdies
As they pass by
But sometimes when I am all alone
Well, sometimes I get a little sad
'Cause there's no one to share my song
No one to fly with me
So sometimes when I am all alone
I think of how happy I would be
If I wasn't alone, and you were here with me...
(Spoken:) You know, there are lots of things you can do when you are alone. Yeah, you can write yourself a little po-em! Or throw a ball up against a wall. Yeah! Yeah, lots of things.
But you know what? I think that lots of times it is nicer to be with someone else than all alone, by yourself.
(Sung:) So sometimes when I am all alone
I think of how happy I would be
If I wasn't alone, and you were here with me...
(Spoken:) And you are here with me! So I am not alone... and I am happy.
—Words and music by Sesame Street stalwart Jeff Moss (see also Lonesome Joan, Rubber Duckie, and I Don't Want to Live On the Moon).
Reproduced without permission.