I Just Want To Be With You All The Time

When a whole writhing bundle of what you have always deeply felt and hoped finds a connection and expression with another human being – that’s what we like to label ‘love’.

The thing about labels, is that they change the experience. When we slap them on, there’s a “whew, now that’s explained!” sensation that comes with them. But the labels themselves arrive with a set of somewhat unacknowledged expectations – some of those are about experiences, and some are about commitments, and a whole narrative gets touched off by the simple application of a word.

I wanted to write a song about the early beginnings of making an authentic, deep connection with another person, without resorting to using the word ‘love’.

And I wanted to take it further from there – without leaving it at some gratuitous bit of lust, but also without assumptions of picket fences and Parent Council meetings lingering in the air. I wanted it to be a song about a living, purposeful, adaptive, engaged relationship with a transformative beginning.

Because while such relationships may include emotional and physical intensities, and maybe even picket fences and Parent Council meetings at some point, the point is that such a connection can be open and adaptable and not just locked into a set of tracks that sets off interminably into the horizon. A relationship can be transformative on an ongoing (although not linear and constant) basis.

The difference between being in love with a person – and not just one fixed idea of who a person is and what a relationship means – is that people change, and relationships can also change, and that can be good. A loving relationship can develop and evolve and still be love.

I wanted this song to put “seize the day” together with “live in the moment”. I wanted it to be mindfulness with enthusiasm, in the context of a relationship. I didn’t want it to be limited to a “we’ve got tonight” kind of song, but I also wanted didn’t want it to be limited to a “we were built to last” kind of song – because buildings tend to be sort of static and fixed and unchanging.

The idea of ‘living in the moment’ doesn’t just mean ‘taking the opportunity’ – it means to be fully engaged emotionally and intellectually engaged, as far as possible, with whatever kind of experience you are having in the now. Existentialism is about really acknowledging what’s going on with how you and others exist in context in each moment, and making your moments meaningful – because within us, we don’t measure life in minutes or hours or days or years, but in those meaningful moments. The more moments that we really live, the fuller our lives are. We can cram quite a bit of living into our days if we approach them in that way, and especially if we do so together.

Anyway, to whatever extent all those hopes for the song were successful, here are the lyrics;

I Just Want To Be With You All The Time

I just want to be with you all the time
I only want to be with you all the time
I want to be beside you, and with you in mind
I want to be all with you, all the time

Forever is a long time
and I must admit
I don’t have the kind of mind
that can conceive of it

But this moment has transformed
both the present and the past
The future would be better too
if we could make this last

I just want to be with you
all the time
I only want to be with you
all the time
I want to be beside you
and with you in mind
I want to be all with you
all the time

I want to be all with you
I want to be all with you
I want to be all with you
All the time
All the time
All the time

I just want to be with you
all the time
I only want to be with you
all the time
I want to be beside you
and with you in mind
I want to be all with you
all the time

I want to be all with you
all the time