Back when I was 4 and I knew the name of every dinosaur   I knew how to read ROM comic books   My babysitter said I was really smart   When the lights went out everything changed   The radio music made me feel strange   And I had a real bad dream about a gorilla in the bathroom      Back when I was 6 I took everything real serious    And I thought that every song that came on the radio   Was referring to strange sexual acts   Because they thought I wouldn't know the facts   And being small is hard and no one ever tells you how      And back when I was 8 I'd sit outside on an old milk crate   And look out at the world from the stoop across the street   The boomboxes and the hot concrete   And every Halloween they hung   A million rubber skeletons across ninth street.      Back when I was 12 or so I swear to god I never felt so low   Everyone but me was making out and eating cookies   I had more than my brain could stand   I threw my life in a garbage can   I felt so weird    I had to disappear   In crying suicide disease.      At 15 getting stoned felt good and it sent me back to childhood   And nothing ever mattered to me more than that.      But then 16 became eclipse    My brain became apocalypse   I was lost and found and I've never been the same.      Back when I was 22 I left the best thing that I knew   and I gave it up for fortune and for fame   I played like I didn't know how   I shocked the world    I wowed the crowd   But I deserved more than what they gave      Back when I was 27 still nothing had been forgiven   Clay turns into rock and rock just sits   So sitting on a crowded beach   I'd pretend I was a leach   And stick to things here and there for a little bit      Back when I was 31 I knew I'd become what I'd become   Nothing left to reveal   And nowhere else to turn   So shocked and withered dumb and bitter   And in need of a babysitter   I'd gladly let my hand fall off and burn burn burn      Back when I turned the big 4-0 I realized just how much there was to go   And I started to think that being alone forever   Wasn't where it was at   So I pulled my head out of the window   And I taught myself how to love real fast   I started talking about painting    With a woman in the laundromat      Back when I was 50 and my first wife had just left me   I felt okay and I sang my daughter   Funny little songs   And just when I thought the best was past   I fell in love for real at last   And it didn't even matter that it had taken me so long      Back when I was 63 the public rediscovered me   My comic books and records had all become rare cult-collector items   Both my parents were deceased   So they didn't see my records get re-released   And I got a dog for the first time in my life      Back when I was 74 my dog died and I got two more   I still felt really good about my daughter   And also about my girlfriend   And I'd sing and draw a little bit   But mostly I'd wake up early and sit   And hang out with the puppies and wish that I could live forever      Back when I was 87 my grandson had just turned eleven   My woman was dead   And my dogs were getting pretty old   My body didn't work quite like it should   But overall things were pretty good   I was getting decent royalties from the reissued comic books and records      Back when I was 106    My only friend   Was one goldfish   Everyone I ever knew was dead and gone   The goldfish never had a name   And the neighbors thought I was insane   And I flushed it down the toilet when I saw it floating upside down*      Back when I was 128 I would sit outside on an old milk crate   And look out at the world from the stoop across the street   The boomboxes and the hot concrete   And every Halloween they hung    A million rubber skeletons across 9th street   Every Halloween they hung    A million rubber skeletons   Every Halloween they hung    A million rubber skeletons   Every Halloween they hung    A million rubber skeletons