"The Roots of My Raising" is a song written by Tommy Collins, and recorded by American country music artist Merle Haggard and The Strangers.
[1] The song, sung in first-person, sees a young man who visits his childhood home for the first time in several years.
Once at home, he sees his father sleeping, comfortably and clutching a photo of his wife (the singer's mother) in his hands.
At this point, he speaks of his now-deceased mother and recalls times where people could take out a bank loan simply on a verbal promise of repayment.
The song also takes a nostalgic look back at, in the singer's view, a simpler time and one of friends and companionship.