Waltz #2

There are two dominant interpretations of these lyrics here: 1) that the song is autobiographical about Elliott Smith's relationship to his distant, divorced mother, which is the majority opinion, or 2) that it's about his own relationships with women - either a specific relationship that started at a distance, or something more general. This is a minority opinion, but it's advanced by at least one person who seems to have some first-hand knowledge of how Smith viewed the song.

There's no reason that both of these interpretations can't be true. A lot of the song's evocative quality, in fact, stems from its combination of a back-story about the singer's relationship to his mother mixed with a painful evocation of his distant attachment to a woman in the present.

What shapes the way a man relates to women romatically? Well, in most cases his relationship to his mother is a good place to start, as far as influences go. To me, this song draws on images of the singer's guilt-ridden relationship to a remote, distant mother to evoke, simultaneously, the painful distance he faces — or one could say, replicates — in his attempt to connect with a specific woman as an adult.

First, a note about the biographical interpretation: It's fascinating, and there can be no doubt that elements of Smith's biography inform this song on many levels: references to his divorced mother, the angry presence of a hostile step-father, and the boy's separation through distance. But it is often reductive to think of a song as just autobiographical. The power of this song doesn't seem to be that Smith is telling us his life story, but rather that he drew on images from his life to create something that resonates with people on many other levels. Just consider, for example, how many commenters here say they can relate to the idea of seeing someone and feeling a romantic connection, and yet realizing the somewhat pathetic absurdity that they don't know the person and never will. If we reduce the song to being just an autobiographical statement on his relationship to his mom, we miss this whole, rich interpretation.

If instead you consider the song is about both his mother and his projected feelings toward a woman in the present, it opens up the lyrics and meaning on many levels.

Haunted by complex emotions over separation from his mother at a young age - with images of fear she'll be abused, anger that she's so distant from him, jealousy of the new man in her life - the song also conjures a singer in the present who sees a woman in the venue where he's performing. The "dead china doll" could be a memory of his distant mother with her new husband years ago, or it could be a woman the singer sees in the bar in the present, someone he longs to be with. Conditioned to love an absent mother, the singer falls into the same exact pattern as an adult, ready to project his deepest romantic longings onto the blank slate of a distant woman, who is a emotionall present to him as a "dead china doll."

The refrain applies equally to his feelings toward his mother and the remote, present woman:

"I'm never gonna know you now, but I'm gonna love you anyhow"

He loved his mother, though he could never know her the way a child is allowed to when living with their mother. And yet despite troubling emotions over her desertion, the singer can't help but feel an impulse of deep love for her. This is the human condition, the human impulse. And not surprisingly, he replicates this same approach to relationships as an adult, seeing a distant woman showing him "no emotion at all" and yet feeling impelled to love her, though he knows he will never actually know her.

The song describes the woman calling "such a familiar name"? It could be his mother in the past calling his name, or the woman in the crowd in the present. Either way, the event triggers a painful memory which the singer is glad is "remote," as he struggles to cope in the present, where he's "doing just fine hour to hour, note to note."

He says "note to note," because singing itself is the act that balances these powerful emotions for the singer. It's therapy and evasion at the same time. And yet darkness and self-loathing lurk right around the corner, banging at the doors of his psyche. The whole experience of loving a distant, icy figure he will never know reinforces the singer's self-hatred, the voice inside his head that tells him,

"You're no good you're no good you're no good / Can't you tell that it's well understood?"

He's tired of this painful process of loving a distant figure. But the phenomenon lives on, even taunting him with a chipper, somewhat false sign off, just as his mother signed off on her letter: "Still going strong / XO, mom."

And what of the image of "Looking out on the substitute scene"? In the biographical interpretation, that's a reference to his mother's work as a substitute teacher. Fine - but consider also that the "substitute scene" is a reference to what's happening in the singer's present. Looking at the distant beloved who he doesn't know is a "substitute scene" for the same longing-without-knowing he experienced with his mother as a child.

His feelings of self-loathing return in the figure of "mr. man with impossible plans." While Mr. Man could surely be a reference to a reviled step father, and the singer could be telling his mom to get the guy to back off, there's a deeper, less literal interpretation. Mr. Man is also connected to that self-loathing inner voice, a part of the singer's psyche that makes "impossible plans" causing frustration and pain, like the plan to connect with the woman who is with another man.

The singer's escape from this torment of impossible plans is to be "In the place where I make no mistakes / In the place where I have what it takes," which is with the microphone, singing to keep the wolves at bay.

In the end, he has to live with the painful pattern, repeating the song's beautiful refrain, "I'm never gonna know you know, but I'm gonna love you anyhow."

The singer cannot escape the pattern, but he can make it manifest - he can make it known to himself - and in that act, the very act of singing his song, he achieves a measure of self-knowledge, a deeper awareness of the pain of existence.

To me, the song is universal because Smith is giving voice very deeply to his own experience, one rooted in the particulars of his life, but which millions of people can relate to. The autobiographic details gave him the raw material, but the song is beautiful because it transcends autobiography to become art.