- I just wanted to know
what your inspiration was,

for How You Dance.

- Oh, for I Hope You Dance?

- [Audience Member] I
Hope You Dance, yeah.

- Oh, you know, I
didn't write it.

Mark Sanders and Tia Sillers,

two writers from
Nashville, wrote it.

It was written
about her divorce,

which people don't know.

But for me, when
I heard the song,

and I have to decide, you know,

"I didn't write this,
so is this something

"that I would wanna sing,

"is this something that
makes sense for me to sing,

"that I can convey believably?"

I thought about my children,

and what I wanted
for them in life.

That was the first thing
that popped into my mind.

- And that's the
calculation that you make

when you're presented with
somebody else's words,

is, "Can I pull this off?

"Can this sound credible
coming out of my mouth?"

Well, that seems
like a perfectly

reasonable way to approach it.

You probably have declined
to sing really good songs--

- Or hit songs.

- So give us an example
of one song that you wish,

if you'd go back in
the world of "I regret,

"if I could go back
and then do it,"

tell us a song
that you passed on

that ultimately became
a hit for somebody else.

- I don't know if there
was a song that I regret.

But there were many
that I passed on

that became hits
for other people.

- But you never went, "Oh god,
I wish I could do that over"?

- No.
- 'Cause you made the right

decision at the right time.

- Yeah.
- I like that attitude.

(Lee Ann laughing)

- I don't know if you
wanna go this way or not,

but I have a question, I've
always been curious about

the audience that you
see for country music

and the connection to
possible politics or beliefs--

- [Host] Politics always
comes up on this show.

- It does, yeah, but I mean
do you see a difference

or is the music generally
for both sides of the aisle,

so to say, or do you
see a split with,

you were talking about
growing up in churches

and gospel music, does that
open up to more diversity?

I'm just asking kind of
a real general question.

- You know, I don't know, but
I hope there's not a split,

because if there's
one thing that

can bring everybody together
it's music, you know?

- Audience is audience,
no matter who they are,

no matter what they believe.

- Yeah, yeah.

- You've stayed largely
clear of that tendency

these days to get more
involved politically.

I remember you played
at President Bush's

second Republican
convention, right,

when he was being renominated.

But other than that
I'm not aware of you

or your music in any way
getting caught up in the--

- No, I did that 'cause
he's a Texan (laughs).

- So the next Texan, we can
count on you coming back?

- Well, probably, probably.

- [Host] Depends upon
who it is, probably,

like everything else.

- Maybe it'll be me.
- Sir.

- I wanna test your memory.

What do you remember about
South Plains College?

- Right, so you went
from Jacksonville

to South Plains
College in Levelland

before going on to
Belmont University,

right, in Nashville.

So you went to
South Plains College

immediately after high school.

Yeah, what do you
remember about that?

What do you remember about
that part of the state?

Very different from east Texas.

- It is, the people though
are still great, you know.

But yes, it's very different.

What do I remember about it?

I remember that that was
the first time in my life

that I was surrounded
by people like me,

because when I was growing up,

everybody thought I was weird

'cause I wanted to
go be a country star.

And I wanted out of
there and everybody else

wanted to stay right
there in that town.

And so I remember
being around people

who were a little bit
weird and different

and sat around
listened to music 24/7.

- It's like living in Austin.

(Lee Ann laughing)

I don't know that "Keep
Levelland Weird" works.

(Lee Ann laughing)
That's okay, ma'am?

- Hi Lee Ann, my
sister and I are here,

we both grew up in
Jacksonville too,

Kirkendall-Dolans, and so
we just wanted to say hi

and we love your music.
- Aw, thank you.

- But I wanted to
hear about some of

your favorite
memories, growing up in

our small town of Jacksonville.

- [Host] What do you remember?

- Oh, (sighs) I remember
driving around a lot,

there was not a lot to do,

so we would drive around.

We drank a lot of beer.

(audience laughing)

And I remember just
thinking, you know,

"I'm gonna go to Nashville
and make records"

and just dreamed about
that all the time.

- Did you think to yourself,
"I have to get out of here"?

- Oh yeah.
(audience laughing)

- Which these days,
one of the persistent

conversations in Texas
is that rural communities

are losing population,
that counties

are losing population,
the urban areas

of Texas are growing
and part is because

kids grow up in
these communities,

they drive around,
drink a lot of beer,

and then they go off to college
and they don't come back.

That was kind of what you
thought you would do also,

go away and not come back.

- Yeah, I mean, I love it,

I have a lot of friends there,

but that's what I
mostly remember,

was going to the lake--
- I was gonna say the lake.

(audience laughing)

- The Tomato Bowl.
- The Tomato Bowl.

- [Host] It was a simpler
time then too, right?

- Yeah.
- I mean, we're the same age,

I know when you grew
up in Jacksonville

and at that point it
was a vastly different

world than it is today.

- It was, I mean,
obviously with the internet

it changed everything.

So you go back there now and
people are more connected

than we were at that time,
to the rest of the world.

- Well, one result of
that I think is that

younger people grow
up faster, right?

Younger people are
much more aware

of the outside world.

I'm not sure that's a
positive around here.

- I don't think
it is (chuckles).

- We're very fortunate to have

such a nice and talented
person as Lee Ann Womack

here with us today.

Please give her a big hand.

(audience applauding)
- Thank you.

- [Host] Thank
you all for coming

and we'll see you again soon.