Personally, I think the song tells the story of Jim's faded love and death in backwords order from the perspective of three different narrators (A Man/Me/Then Jim). Each verse reveals a new part of the story...
The first verse is an example of faded love between a man and his old girlfriend who reunite at Jim's funeral. The Man tells us exactly what the suicide note said and his "ex-first love" explains that Jim "just lived within the slow-fade of love," or that he had some sort of a failed relationship in his life that probably led him to his end.
Next comes the second verse as told by "Me." I interpret that "Me" is the Man's ex-first love from the funeral and that this verse explains how she knew that Jim "just lived within the slow fade of love." She spoke on the phone with Jim's wife who makes a "living is the problem" comment, parralleling Jim's suicide note. This line obviously connects the woman on the phone to Jim. I guess, according to the verse, their marriage was unhappy, so Jim left and took their daughter.
The 3rd verse, as told by Jim, also sort of mirrors the first verse in the sense that both men in the song attempt to rekindle their relationships with their old loves. The way I take it, Jim goes desperately back to Diana, but she totally rebuffs his advances and is completely indifferent. As someone mentioned earlier, she has moved on from that "old house." Then all Jim can do is die, which he does, making a sarcastic comment in his suicide note to his wife, Diana, and thus we return to the beginning of the song, Jim's funeral.
Personally, I think the song tells the story of Jim's faded love and death in backwords order from the perspective of three different narrators (A Man/Me/Then Jim). Each verse reveals a new part of the story...
The first verse is an example of faded love between a man and his old girlfriend who reunite at Jim's funeral. The Man tells us exactly what the suicide note said and his "ex-first love" explains that Jim "just lived within the slow-fade of love," or that he had some sort of a failed relationship in his life that probably led him to his end.
Next comes the second verse as told by "Me." I interpret that "Me" is the Man's ex-first love from the funeral and that this verse explains how she knew that Jim "just lived within the slow fade of love." She spoke on the phone with Jim's wife who makes a "living is the problem" comment, parralleling Jim's suicide note. This line obviously connects the woman on the phone to Jim. I guess, according to the verse, their marriage was unhappy, so Jim left and took their daughter.
The 3rd verse, as told by Jim, also sort of mirrors the first verse in the sense that both men in the song attempt to rekindle their relationships with their old loves. The way I take it, Jim goes desperately back to Diana, but she totally rebuffs his advances and is completely indifferent. As someone mentioned earlier, she has moved on from that "old house." Then all Jim can do is die, which he does, making a sarcastic comment in his suicide note to his wife, Diana, and thus we return to the beginning of the song, Jim's funeral.
Hope that makes a little sense...
-Kiley