Coming Up Roses Top Ten: Eleven Roses (#7)

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The doctor’s appointment went even better than expected! He took me off the cholesterol medication!! It may be only temporary, but my numbers were fine (and my legs have too many cramps in them). Oh, and he loved my “Mongo only pawn in game of life” face mask, too. (Face masks are now optional at VA facilities, but I’ll keep on wearing mine, thank you.) Everything came up roses yesterday, and in celebration here’s another song with “rose” in the title. #7: Eleven Roses - Hank Williams Jr. For those of you who might be in total shock at the looks and sound of that fella in the video, I assure you, that is Hank Jr. That’s before the accident. (I’ve mentioned this before: he fell nearly 500 feet from a rock on Ajax Mountain in Montana in 1975, busting his skull open and costing him an eye. Thankfully, his friend/manager Merle Kilgore [as in, the guy credited with co-writing “Ring of Fire”] was with him, or he may not have survived to get ready for some football with his rowdy friends.) This was co-written by an underrated favorite of mine, Darrell McCall. He said he was inspired to send his mother eleven roses for Mother’s Day one year, with a note, “Look in the mirror and the 12th rose will be looking back at you.” Such a sweet sentiment!!! He put it in this song that’s basically about a guy trying to make up for an unspecified sin (“after what I’ve done you may not keep the roses”) by sending flowers. It doesn’t matter which era of Hank Jr. you’re talking about, this is one of his best songs. Eleven Roses Written by Darrell McCall and Lamar Morris Recorded by Hank Williams Jr. From Eleven Roses, 1972 They say more than words can say: