“Rain on Your Birthday,” is a sweet, rock-solid, bold, tender, tuneful and profound song of the love between father and sons in the tradition of Harry Chapin’s “Cat’s in the Cradle.” Everyone must hear this, immediately and many times over.
This is the debut work by The Cold Return, the latest project of Timothy Riley, the San Diego lawyer and songwriter who has previously worked with the Sinners.
Haunting, perceptive, stirring and beautiful, “Rain” is a father’s exasperated yawp of isolation and anger at God amid the confusion following a child’s adverse medical diagnosis. Riley hopes the highly personal song will help other parents deal with bad news from their children’s doctor.
“Specifically it is a song that I began writing on the 2nd birthday of my twin boys, a day when it was raining in San Diego and as a result ruining the plans for an outdoor party,” says Riley. “However, what was on my mind that day was concern over the future of both of my boys because both had recently been diagnosed as having Autism Spectrum Disorder.”
“The lyrics were crafted from the advice I began to formulate in my head,” Riley continues. “My boys were classified with a condition that has baffled medical science. I grew up with two brothers who suffered from cystic fibrosis, a crippling and terminal illness. I was angry at God and wanted to express it. I thought the serious health related tragedies in my family were behind me, but now new versions emerged and my vision for the healthy happy family that I wanted felt dashed.”
The verses, say Riley, feature an advice-giving voice which is “forecasting what their life is going to be and then of course the chorus blames it on the angels.”
But the forecasting voice has been proven wrong by time. In the intervening years, says Riley, “The boys have not suffered anything like those I feared. They are developing into beautiful and quizzical adolescents. They turn eleven in November. They aren’t much different than the “neurotypical kids.” Most of their challenges relate to processing sensory information, but that gets addressed for instance at school with “supports,” or accommodations made– in light of the barriers to learning and competitive academics– for the autistic.”
If Riley has any advice for other parents in similar situations, it would be that “an autism diagnosis of your child may blindside you, and even terrify you because of the things you have heard or read, or prevalent stereotypes. It might threaten plans you have for them. All these things were true for me but my sons are as beautiful, goofy, mischievous and imperfect as any so called normal 10 year old. So my advice is that they probably arent the problem. How you deal with the unexpected might be. Love them one day at a time. Don’t pretend like you know how their lives will play out. Above all else just love and enjoy them from one moment to the next and keep it simple. Everything’s gonna be alright.”
