Story Behind The Song

I used to see an old guy walking around the neighborhood every day and then he stopped. It made me wonder what happened to him. Then I started thinking about the old men who push carts and collect bottles and cans and how they got to that point.

Song Description

I man who has a happy life with a loving family has it all taken away in the blink of an eye. Needless to say it changes his life forever.

Lyrics

Dirty Old Man
Mark Harrison ASCAP

Here comes that old man again
Pushing his cart in the rain
He's talking to himself but no one cares
They just want him to go away.
There's a photograph of a younger man
In the bottom of his cart
The evidence of better times
Before his whole life fell apart

Now he's a dirty old man
Picking up bottles and cans
Just a dirty old man
He just wants someone to talk to
He wants his old life back again
Because the last thing he ever wanted
Was to wake up one day
Just a dirty old man,
A dirty old man.

Used to have a different life
He used to laugh and play
He had two little kids a loving wife
Another child on the way.
A drunken driver spoiled that dream
He held himself to blame
And crushed by guilt and loneliness
He's never been the same

(CHORUS)

His life was changed in the blink of an eye
Now he can never go home
And a life so filled with promise
Is now an old man walking alone.

The last thing he ever wanted
The last thing he could ever plan
The last thing he ever dreamed about
Was that one day
He'd be a dirty old man
Just a dirty old man.
Dirty old man
Just a dirty old man.