The Waiting Game
Riding Bikes Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
The lyrics of Riding Bikes’s song The Waiting Game express the singer’s frustration and disappointment with a failed relationship. The singer is tired of waiting for the other person to come around and fulfill their promises. They wish they had never been led on to believe that their story would end happily ever after. The singer is exhausted and recognizes that they always seem to rise only to fall for the same line.
The line “you think you got your two hands wrapped around my throat” suggests that the other person has a lot of control over the singer, and that they feel suffocated by their grip. However, the singer declares that they are not going to be strangled by the other person’s hold anymore. They are slipping through their palms and moving on without them.
Overall, the lyrics convey a sense of disillusionment and frustration with love, relationships, and the waiting game that often comes with them. The singer seems to be embracing their independence and refusing to be held back by someone who has consistently let them down.
Line by Line Meaning
Impatiently waiting to hopelessly stop pacing.
Feeling restless and anxious while waiting for something to happen, yet knowing deep down that it is futile to continue pacing back and forth.
I just can't keep chasing you.
Realizing that relentlessly pursuing someone who continuously eludes one's grasp is not worth the effort anymore.
I wish that you would have never lead me on to believe that we could ever be a story.
Regretting the false hope given by the person who had made promises and raised expectations for a relationship that was never meant to be.
That ended happily with you and me and me calling you baby.
Imagining a fairy tale ending with the two of them in a romantic relationship, where one person is calling the other 'baby' as a term of endearment.
You said that we would always make it and now I'm stuck here waiting.
Recalling the assurance given by the other person that they would be together and succeed in their relationship, yet now being trapped in a state of waiting and uncertainty.
For you to come around. I won't hold my breath, you always let me down.
Expecting the other person to finally fulfill their promises, but not being too hopeful given the disappointment and letdowns experienced before.
I guess that I finally realize that this time it's just another lie.
Admitting to oneself that the previous promises of a happy ending were all empty words and there is no real hope for a successful relationship.
Why do I always seem to rise, just to fall all for the same line.
Questioning one's own tendency to get hopeful and strive for something that is always out of reach, just to be let down by familiar patterns of behavior from the other person.
You think you got your two hands wrapped around my throat, so tight that I might choke. Well not this time, this time you're wrong.
Feeling suffocated and overpowered by the other person's control and manipulation, yet asserting oneself that they will not succumb to it this time.
Just read the lifeline, I'm slipping through your palms.
Indicating that the other person's grasp is slipping away, and they can no longer hold onto something that was never truly theirs to begin with.
Contributed by Hailey H. Suggest a correction in the comments below.