Not another Bob Dylan concert

Just because we bought your stuff doesn’t mean we owe you anything.

Flash back: You are at a Bob Dylan concert. And it is awful. It is so awful that you feel like recording it and re-playing it back to him in an attempt to make him appreciate what you are going through. It is so awful that you close your eyes in an attempt to block the thought of all the money you have given him over the years, not to mention the small fortune you’ve spent to be here along with all these other suckers. You try not to think of how far the cost of the ticket would have gone–– grocery for a couple of weeks or more, the tube fare for the month, a (minuscule) part of the down payment on a new flat, even a meaningless bauble for I, me, myself. For you’ve had it up to here subsiding other people’s lifestyle. At the very least you’ll go home and Google ‘Henry Timrod’.

But the hype like an iron clamp will grip your throat and even though people are getting up during the songs to refill their glasses to drown their sorrow, they will give you hard, meaningful glances. As if they’ve identified you as the weakest link. For they’ve worked long and hard on what they’ll put up on facebook along with blurry pictures of Dylan (in the same, white hat always) seen from, what appears to be many, many miles away. (Is he even there?) And no one can take that away from them. Damn it! After this they deserve something. Anything.

Was ‘mumblecore*’ invented to describe the brutality being unleashed on stage? And the eyes turn back towards you; smoldering holes in your back. You have been scarred for life.

But it’s al’right, Ma. I was already bleeding.

Flash forward:

You, “Dylan is playing at Hop Farm this summer.”

Me, “Yeah. Right.”

Both together, “Ha ha ha ha ha.”

Tears of laughter. Over and out.

*Nope. It is a term used to describe low-budget independent American films of early 2000's. Do they have anything in common with Bob Dylan? Answer: Well, you've heard Dylan muttering on stage. Now would you call him a 'slacker'?

A year in the life - 2009

(click on image to enlarge and read)
Sit quietly, doing nothing, spring comes, and the grass grows by itself*. Another year in a life.

*zen saying

Words

When she said,
“Don’t waste your words, they’re just lies,”
I cried she was deaf.*

Every time your phone rings it plays these words and it is rather fitting. Though you, as you often say so yourself, aren’t a misanthrope for you don’t mind the presence of humans it’s just that you hate it when they try to converse. It’s this process of passage of clean fresh air through the vocal chords and the resultant production of noxious, inane blather that gets you every time. But what irks you even more is that perfectly enunciated words, beautifully connected together to produce an uncomplicated sentence to elucidate a simple thought get subdued by the above-mentioned process. And all we are left with is 'idiot wind'. But that doesn’t mean you are a misanthrope or for that matter a hater of words or speech.

As proof you point out how you can often be found spending time with words of humans, albeit of those whom you are pretty certain you’ll never be able to meet in person. And you further point out how much faith and consideration you put in the thoughts and words of complete strangers although you are pretty sure they too won’t grace you with their presence. So you conclude it’s not words or speech that is at fault it’s just you who is unfortunate to be saddled with people who are inept at handling them.

But what you find most fascinating is when the blathering hordes eat your cake and drink your coffee and wiping the crumbs from the corner of their mouths say, “Just because you are good with words doesn’t mean you can say anything.” Made even more fascinating, you add, by the fact that while they were busy stuffing their faces you hadn’t even uttered a single word.

*Bob Dylan, 

Fee, fie, fo, fum

Aparna says you are hilarious.
Gwen says you are hard to understand.
Lakshmi says you think you are a subconscious genius.
Ainara says you cheered me up.
Barbara says you are a good memory for me.
Ingur says you were always special.
Namrita says you are like jam on otherwise boring bread and butter days.

And I say,
I’m just average, common too
I’m just like him, the same as you
I’m everyone’s brother and son
I ain’t different from anyone
It ain’t no use a-talking to me
It’s the same as talking to you.

Actually that’s what Dylan, the other Dylan, Bob Dylan says.