Day 32 – Imagine

Today would have been John Lennon’s 70th birthday.

When I was in New York last year, there was a special section of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Annex dedicated to John Lennon. It was put together by Yoko Ono apparently, and was very well done — if not a little disturbing. The room was piano white, with white displays holding clear glass to house such memorabilia photos and records. And the bag of bloody clothes, unopened, that the New York Police Department returned to Yoko. That’s how powerful the display was, knowing that the clothes were bloody without even being able to see them. It could have been anyone’s (rather large) sack lunch. But you knew it wasn’t.

The thing that really got me though was a poster Yoko had made. It featured a photo she took at dawn the morning after he died of the first morning’s rays beaming through his blood-splashed sun glasses. The title said something like “Since John Lennon Died, 875,000 more people have died in the United States from handguns.” How utterly poignant and heart-wrenching and beautiful. A note said that she updates it each year.

I listened to the “Beatles lost tapes” of John Lennon fooling around writing Strawberry Fields Forever. You listen to that, and you realize how ridiculous it is to ask him what the words mean. He’s just plunking away on the guitar, trying out different notes and different lyrics, just letting the music carry him along. A true artist. There were no hidden meanings, just a bunch of words that sounded like they made sense with the music, absently plucked out of the air like grapes from a plate.

Why did you pick that grape? Well, I didn’t really, it was there… I guess it picked me.

I tried to pick grapes in his honour today, and was mostly successful.

~Graham

(Novel Writing Totals)

Hours Today: 1
Words Today: 1,525
Hours Total: 31.5
Words Total: 43,906