annanotbob2's Diaryland Diary

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You only got ten

Haha - I've found a way to copy from my big notebook - it's propped up against a big jar of coconut oil that's been lurking on this table since I last polished sea glass with it.
So, today in writing group the theme was hibernation or underground or anything related or unrelated and as usual B had asked on Facebook for song titles around that. Subterranean Homesick Blues by Dylan was mentioned, so I went for that. Here's the video, from the 1960s and here's what I wrote (I feel a bit guilty about the story with Daughter, because the bloke in question has changed a lot over the years and I like him a lot now, but fuck it, eh?):

"Subterranean Homesick Blues by Dylan, lovely, cantankerous Bobby Dylan - I named my last cat after him although she was female. [not strictly true, but partially so] My grandson used to call her Bobby which has led to me thinking of Dylan as Bobby, cos fuck him - if he's always gonna do it his way, all the time, which he is, then so am I. This song is the one with the video - so early to have a video - with him flicking through those giant sheets of paper with words on "Basement, pavement, government, kid..." I already loved him when I first saw it, but even more when I saw all those words, all that paper he struggles to manage.
I love that he writes so many I don't love you songs, like Idiot Wind, I Don't Know Why I Love You Like I Do, Don't Think Twice It's Alright.
The basement song is beloved also because Daughter, then aged about 15 saw off a (then) pompous bloke (married to one of my dearest pals), self appointed Dylan expert. We were in a field, there was a fire, a guitar, someone played the opening chords and the bloke and Daughter both started singing "Johnny's in the basement..." and she knew all the words whereas he forgot half way through and was visibly, silently furious to be out-Dylaned by a child, a girl child at that. The rest of us silently, visibly exchanged glances that said "tee hee!"
I love that Dylan tells different versions of his life every time he's asked, even down to his birthplace. I love that he didn't go to collect his Nobel Prize at the ceremony and I love that Patti Smith forgot the words of Hard Rain's Gonna Fall she was singing at that ceremony in tribute to him and held her hand up, stopped the musicians, apologised and asked to start again. These are my people."

Straight after that I took my little dog and went down on the beach for the lowest of low tides and we walked three miles on the hard sun and healed our broken souls a bit. Then I came home and started a thread on my Facebook page of Dylan's fuck you songs and it was all good.

Three Good Things today:
1. Writing group - I love this group. If we ever get properly out of this lockdown I'm going to catch a train to Sheffield and go to a real one, all of us in B's studio that she only opened last January and had to close down in March. Meanwhile I've started sketching them while they're reading out their work and this week two of them had traces of likeness going on. I wish I had their words in front of me as they read - I can never hold them long enough in my mind to comment properly, even before I was sketching.
2. Junior Bake Off - what could be better than GBBO? Junior Bake Off, that's what. With mad Harry Hill hosting, lovely Liam as one of the judges and gorgeously serious little darlings who can cook amazingly and remind me of what I miss about teaching. Channel 4 at 5 or catch up on All4. The one who went home today was so like my brother aged 10, I had my heart in my throat to watch him,
3. Doing the Covid test, sending it off and feeling less panicky at once.

Night night xx

11:34 p.m. - 13.01.21

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