Song Description

A farmer and a tinker exchange a wife for a pony and caravan - and also their ways of life ... but there is suspiciomn of foul play

Lyrics

FAIR EXCHANGE

They say that Dan, the farmer, had been married late in life
Forty seven summers gone before he took a wife
a woman from the town who thought she?d like the country life
although she was some twenty years his junior
Well after six warm months or so the temperature declined
the words got few and far between and passion fell behind
they lived together quietly like two odd socks on the line
and they only pulled together at the milking

Seventeen months later and no babby in the cot
the farmer looked around himself to see what he had got
A stony wife in stony ground ? that seemed to be his lot
He thought he couldn't face another winter
The wife was disenchanted with the quiet of the farm
for she'd been used to company and someone on her arm
but the only one she ever saw was Tim, the tinker man
when he passed that way with caravan and pony

The farmer's mood got blacker as he viewed his stony ground
One day he took his bicycle and likewise fifty pound
he nodded to his missus he was heading for the town
and she watched him disappearing up the loanin?
He hadn't travelled far until he spied a tinker man
who was poking at a fire for to boil a billy can
they struck up conversation, tinker Tim and Farmer Dan
where the rocky road it winds around the mountain

The tinker spoke of hardships in his moveable abode
and how modern times were most unkind for travelers on the road
while the farmer moaned and mumbled with his own sad episode
they swapped their troubles well into the evening
Well, to make the story shorter they agreed upon a plan
that the farmer take the pony and the tinker's caravan
while the tinker try his fortune with the farmer?s wife and land
and make what sense they could out of the bargain

A wondrous idea it seems and maybe no surprise
the farmer's wife was overjoyed with all that did arise
For she had just been thinking of the need to advertise
When heaven smiled upon her situation
As far as I can gather now the deal was for a year
but it's more than seven summers since the farmer disappeared
While the man who'd been a tinker loves the farming atmosphere
and his five wee children help him at the milkin'


And so I'll end my story though a strange one it may be
How peoples? lives are altered with some ingenuity
As to where the farmer went to - that remains a mystery
but his missus and the tinker's not surmisin?

Some say he went to Dublin where he met a millionaire
who bein' a far out relative made sure he got his share
Some say he might be buried with a caravan and mare
where the rocky road it winds around the mountain

Playlist Creator	Playlist Name	Date Added
Brian Cunningham	Something Funny	2/15/2012