Tegan and Sara - Where Does The Good Go

The 2023 Calgary Stampede’s Coca-Cola stage was blessed with a home coming return of our girls, Tegan and Sara. I sure think it was cool of them to do a free show, surely, they are popular enough to have performed at one of the larger venues during the Stampede, this is their hometown, they are popular here. So, a free show is a wonderful gift, and I was very happy to see them again. I believe this was the fifth time I have seen Tegan and Sara live. It was an interesting double feature, Death From Above, and, Tegan and Sara. I can only count four things they have in common, they are both Canadian, duo acts, became established musicians around the same time, and most importantly, both are freaking great.

While I really enjoyed Death From Above, being the more intense fan of Tegan and Sara, I very much enjoyed them. It did not hurt that they played many, perhaps, most, of my favorite songs of theirs. I think it was the second, or perhaps third, song they played was “Where Does the Good Go.”

Sometimes, passage of time, modifies our appreciation of things. Small differences in perspective and memory can cause some songs to become more or less loved in our hearts in time. “Where Does the Good Go” for me, is a song that is endlessly wonderful. This song connected to me when I first heard it, and has only strengthened my appreciation for it.

As it happens sometimes, I will quote a song often enough that the quote becomes part of my casual vernacular, and the line from “Where Does The Good Go” that has accomplished that in my conversation pieces is from the chorus;

“It's love that leaves and breaks,
The seal of always thinking you would be,
Real happy and healthy, strong and calm.
Where does the good go?
Where does the good go?”

It is a good chorus.

Like many before me, on a great number of different songs, I was singing the words to this chorus wrong, in multiple different ways, until I finally figured out the correct lyrics. Mostly, I kept breaking out the adjectives to be applied to two people. As in, you will be happy and healthy, and I will be strong and calm. Perhaps this is my unrelentingly masculine perspective, but a primary goal of any relationship for me is to ensure, that she, is happy and healthy, meanwhile, I must be strong and calm.

“Happy and healthy.”

As a knight, I want to rescue princesses. But, I want to do this, with the hope, the dream, that they will be forever afterward happy and healthy. Drop the metaphor, and a goal I always held in my mind for romantic relationships would be to support my bride to be those two things.

“Strong and calm.”

As a knight, I feel it is extremely important to remain strong and calm. Strong, obviously because dragons need slaying. Calm, because that aids enormously in maintain the honourable codes of chivalry. Again, drop the metaphor, it was always important to me to be those two things. Not just towards woman of my desire, but always professionally, and in everything I do.

Admittedly, I am a lot better at the former than the later. I am always very strong. Sometimes I am a hot head.

That is the linchpin of my perspective, and thus, these two adjectives reoccurring in my verbal expressions. I have re-written, the chorus to where does the good go so many times in my head, that it is funny. We are all guilty of it, singing along to a song with the wrong words. I sang dozens of different versions of this chorus until finally getting it right.

There actually are not many lyrics in “Where Does The Good Go.” The repetition is appropriate, as the statements being made are powerful. Love, and heartbreak, and longing, and wanting, can take things away from us, including the positive characteristics, that make us who we are. We can lose our happiness, and our strengthens. We can lose our kindness.

“Where does the good go?”

As much as plea, as a question.

It has been one of my favorites of Tegan and Sara’s for years. I enjoyed hearing it with an small army of friends.

Thanks again for the free show Tegan and Sara.

- King of Braves