Mary Chapin Carpenter Songs - He Thinks He'll Keep Her Lyrics

Mary Chapin Carpenter - He Thinks He'll Keep Her

Mary Chapin Carpenter - He Thinks He'll Keep Her Lyrics and Youtube Music Videos

Album: Come On, Come On
Released: 1992

He Thinks He'll Keep Her Lyrics

She makes his coffee, she makes his bed
She does the laundry, she keeps him fed
When she was twenty one she wore her mother's lace
She said, "Forever," with a smile upon her face

She does the carpool, she P.T.A.'s
Doctors and dentists, she drives all day
When she was twenty nine she delivered number three
And ev'ry Christmas card showed a perfect family

Ev'rything runs right on time
Years of practice and design
Spit and polish till it shines
He Thinks He'll Keep Her
Ev'rything is so benign
The safest place you'll ever find
God forbid you change your mind
He thinks he'll keep her

She packs his suitcase, she sits and waits
With no expression upon her face
When she was thirty-six she met him at the door
She said, "I'm sorry, I don't love you any more"

Ev'rything runs right on time
Years of practice and design
Spit and polish till it shines
He thinks he'll keep her
Ev'rything is so benign
The safest place you'll ever find
God for bid you change your mind
He thinks he'll keep her

For fifteen years she had a job and not one raise in pay
Now she's in the typing pool at minimum wage

Ev'rything runs right on time
Years of practice and design
Spit and polish till it shines
He thinks he'll keep her
Ev'rything is so benign
The safest place you'll ever find
At least until you change your mind
(He thinks he'll keep her)
Writer/s: Carpenter, Mary Chapin / Schlitz, Don
Publisher: Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC, Universal Music Publishing Group, CAROL VINCENT & ASSOC LLC
Lyrics licensed and provided by LyricFind

He Thinks He'll Keep Her

This song was inspired by a 1970s Geritol TV commercial (which would now be regarded as extremely sexist and patronizing), in which a husband cites his wife's many attributes, summarizing with, "I think I'll keep her."

This song is about a woman who lives a typical, anodyne life devoted to her husband and family, but then after 15 years becomes fed up with the monotony and leaves him. Carpenter wrote the song with Don Schlitz, a Country music songwriting stalwart who wrote the Kenny Rogers hit "The Gambler."

With a more pop-oriented sound and an influx of female stars, country music went mainstream in the early '90s, leading to a 2-hour CBS special in 1993 called The Women of Country. This song, with its message of female empowerment, was a showcase song, with Carpenter performing it with Emmylou Harris, Trisha Yearwood, Suzy Bogguss, Pam Tillis , Patty Loveless, and Kathy Mattea.

Carpenter, who was raised in the Northeast and graduated from Brown University, was hailed as a new kind of Country singer - one that could appeal to an audience far outside the typical fan base of the genre.