1. Mercifully, because I was worn out (in a good way) from all time I spent with friends yesterday, The Grove's checkout time was 12:00 and I didn't have to rush to gather myself and get out the door. So, I took my time, enjoyed a couple of toasted sesame bagels with butter and coffee, packed up, gassed up at a nearby Costco, and hit the road.
While driving south on I-5, I listened to part 2 of Dan Mackay's two part episode exploring Bob Dylan's album Time Out of Mind on his brilliant weekly show, Hard Rains and Slow Trains.
I'm slowly serving my apprenticeship as a listener of Bob Dylan. I look to Dan, Jeff, Michael, Cas, Pete, Mark, and others as my mentors. I'm not sure I'll ever be a Dylan journeyman. The canon is so huge, my start is so late in life, but I don't need to be anything other than what I am: curious, interested, and open to learn and enjoy.
Okay.
That said, I'm most drawn to Dylan as a writer of love songs: lost love, desired love, longing for a love, and others. I think of Bob Dylan's face when he and Joan Baez talk at a bar in Scorsese's Rolling Thunder Revue. Now, granted, I don't know anything about Bob Dylan and Joan Baez's history. What I see in Bob Dylan's face, though, is regret, the look of having lost a love, maybe even the look of love sickness. He concludes their conversation with, "you see, it's heart, it's not head".
So, today, I listened to Dan play three versions of Mississippi that Dylan recorded while making Time Out of Mind. The song, however, appeared on a later album, Love and Theft.
I was drawn to the wistful words of this song, the longing the persona telling the story has for Rosie, how he dreams of things that Rosie said, how he dreams to be in Rosie's bed. Later he says (and this might be about Rosie) that he crossed that river just to be with her. I hear regret in the words "Only one thing I did wrong/I stayed in Mississippi a day too long". Did that day too long cost him his love? Well, I don't really know in my head, but in my heart those are words of love regret.
Dan closed his show with Dylan's beloved song "Make You Feel My Love". The song, to me, expands upon a sentiment Dylan returns to from time to time having to do with all that the persona of the song would do for his beloved. In "Mississippi" the persona crossed the Mississippi River just to be with his beloved. Later tonight, I listened to Dylan and The Band perform "Baby, Let me Follow You Down". In this song, well, maybe the persona would cross the Mississippi follow this "baby" down, I don't know. What I do know is that Dylan writes that he would do anything in this God Almighty world just to follow this baby down. He'd buy her a wedding gown. He'd buy her a diamond ring. Anything.
Well, in "Make You Feel My Love", he expands upon this same "I'd do anything" idea in order for the beloved to feel his love. I won't list all the things here, but we get a pretty good idea of what comprises "anything in this God Almighty world" he sang about when he was much younger: now it includes going hungry, going black and blue, crawling down the avenue, even going to the ends of the Earth for you. Anything, man. Anything in this God Almighty world.
It might be particular to me, but I experience these "I'd do anythings" through my experience of having read Rumi.
At the core of the human being, of the human experience is the longing for union.
It's strong. We feel like we'd do anything in this God Almighty world to know it.
Bob Dylan doesn't express this longing or desire for union or this willingness to do what it takes to experience it every song.
But he sure does from time to time.
2. The last time I saw Jane (Eischen) Hansen was when she drove to Eugene in July of 2017 to join me in the audience to hear Babes with Axes play their second reunion show (there hasn't been a third one yet).
So, today, we met up in a credit union parking lot and we caravanned out to her and Jim's wondrous rural home. Jim has been sculpting metal and making other tactile art for decades. Several of his works are on display in the huge stretch of lawn that extends from their house. Many others are in Jim's studio.
Jim is now in his late nineties. He's no longer sculpting, but just recently panels he made for a building in Vancouver sixty years ago were moved from their original building to near the waterfront and Jim and Jane attended the dedication of these panels having been moved and installed.
Jane and I settled into a great conversation about our families and some of the latest news in our lives. Both of us have quite recently become cat owners. Jane rescued two cats and I took in Copper and Luna after Kathy fell ill. It was fun talking about cats and seeing the two handsome cats Jane now cares for and enjoys.
We ended our time with a tour of Jim's studio and I saw all the work Jane has done to organize it and to inventory Jim's work.
It's mighty impressive not only to see all that Jim has produced but to see the beauty and power of his work.
So that I might reach the airbnb where I'm staying before dark, after I'd been at Jane and Jim's for about an hour, Jane once again drove the pilot pick up and led me safely back to I-5.
I am very grateful for our visit and for her help leading me to and back from their house.
3. I saved the leftovers from dinner at La Rustica and was I ever glad I did.
I arrived at the tiny house I booked in SE Portland tuckered out, gloriously tuckered out, from the great visits I had with friends and from driving and walking so much.
In other words, I didn't have to go out for dinner.
Along with the Italian food, I had some Trader Joe's snacks.
I ate, put on my nightwear, and went on line and watched videos of The Band, including their performance of "Baby, Let me Follow You Down", from the movie The Last Waltz.
The Band really got to me.
I could hardly bear knowing that Rick Danko, Richard Manuel, and Levon Helm have died. I mourned. I marveled at their youth and energy. My eyes were wet. I love The Band more and more as I grow older and older.
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