I could probably change 15 to 16 (and perhaps get rid of the curseword in the final verse). But, looking at the comments here, would that make a difference? I was thinking about how I decided to write this song, and the choices musically and otherwise, and I suspect that in the back of my mind was that 1971 film, Summer of '42. A boy, who is also 15, has his first sexual experience with an older women. She's closer to the boy's age, being in her 20s, but she is still an adult female who sexually initiates a 15-year-old. I might also have been affected, without thinking about it, by Michel Legrand's hauntingly beautiful score and the song at the heart of it, "The Summer Knows." I suspect I was going for the same sad, wistful feeling in the intro.

What I find interesting, though, is that Summer of '42 seems to get away with it. I wondered if the film had provoked any moral indignation at the time, so I went back and read some reviews that came out when the film was first released (NY Times, Roger Ebert, etc.) To my surprise, I couldn't find any that mentioned "pedophilia" or objected to the film's theme, or the actions of the Jennifer O'Neill character, on that basis. Are we living in different time with different sensibilities? Or was the movie just so sweet and drenched in nostalgia that few could condemn the plotline? Frankly, I don't think the movie would have worked if the boy had been 17. I think there is something about being about 15, in that stage between childhood and adulthood, that is necessary for this kind of story. But what do I know. Still, I wonder how people would have responded to Summer of '42 if it had been released in 2013, instead of 1971.