photograph by houston cofield
In 1961, William Bell, the Memphis soul singer, was on tour as a vocalist with the Phineas Newborn Orchestra. He was 21, maybe 22, the tour had stopped in New York City, and Bell was keenly homesick for Memphis. He wrote a song about it: “You Don’t Miss Your Water.” Recorded later that year at Stax, the song performs a rare kind of magic trick: Whoever listens to it, at whatever moment in their life, finds the melody and the words grafting onto the truest, deepest heartache harbored within. The song’s universal, but I dare you not to experience the emotion of it with the utmost specificity.
In the beginning, you really loved me
But I was too blind and I couldn’t see
But now you’ve left me, oh, how I cry
You don’t miss your water till your well runs dry
I don’t know if Bell was using water strictly as a metaphor, or if he was thinking about Memphis as a city defined by water — most obviously by the Mississippi River, mighty and muscular, but just as importantly by the Memphis Sand Aquifer, the invisible ocean beneath us.
I kept you crying, sad and blue
I was a playboy and I wouldn’t be true
But when you left me and said ‘Bye, bye’
I missed my water, my well ran dry
There’s no Memphis, not in any recognizable way, without our water. But as a city, we’ve been slow to realize that the vast resource of our aquifer is not an infinite promise. The pure, clear water flowing from our taps is ancient rain, protected by the earth, and brought to our lips safely thanks to carefully managed processes.
Now, I sit and wonder and how can this be?
I never thought you’d ever leave me
But now you’ve left me, oh, how I cry
You don’t miss your water till your well runs dry
In our September cover story, written by David Waters (the right man for the job by skill and by surname!), we explore the miracle of Memphis water — and the people working to understand and mitigate threats to our most important natural resource. (If you think a long story about water sounds oddly dry, I challenge you to read David’s words and not experience some new sense of profundity in your next glass of water, your next shower, or the next time you water your garden.)
You don’t miss your water till your well runs dry.
Speaking of gardens, our Habitats feature this month is actually about the outside of a home rather than its interior; spend some time in the delightful microcosm of one Hein Park couple’s outdoor space.
Plus, we give you a first look into the Metal Museum’s new campus in Overton Park (but don’t worry: They’re keeping the riverfront space for events and artist residencies).
Interspersed throughout are a few more … tributaries, let’s call them, or rivulets: Our City Journal column this month is a companion piece to the cover story, and don’t miss Martha Kelly’s “Last Stand” illustration in which she looks at a few ways Memphis water flows into different areas of our culture.
As always, thank you for reading. Let’s all stay hydrated — and stay grateful for the “miracle beneath our feet.”
