Dear Altes on Memorial Day Weekend:
As you know Bob Dylan turned 80 this week. We’re all older now.
Here he is at early appearance in 1961. I’ve listened to this concert three times today. It’s wonderful.
I loved him. Still do.
People have tried to talk me out of Dylan over the years, especially when he won the Nobel Prize and so many posted How Could He articles. He not only could. He did.
Why we love and what we do is often elusive. Explanations come afterwards. Love comes first, and then reasons. And when it vanishes, which happens more often than not, the explanations change.
My mother who lived near Liberace in North Dakota (she claimed her mother said Does He Think That’s Music) also claimed a vague connection to Dylan (although she was much more Irving Berlin herself) through his family who lived in Hibbing, Minnesota. Nearby enough to possibly know his neighbors. That’s what she said. And she reported that they described him as odd. Maybe not as odd as Liberace, but odd enough.
Here’s where he lived in Hibbing.
Chronicles, his autobiography read by Sean Penn was the first audio book I listened too. I am a book book type, and didn’t expect much. It was mesmerizing.
Robert Allen Zimmerman was born May 24, 1941. His paternal grandparents, Anna Kirghiz and Zigman Zimmerman, emigrated from Odessa after the pogroms against Jews of 1905.His maternal grandparents, Florence and Ben Stone, were Lithuanian Jews who arrived in the United States in 1902.
Now for some OFFICIAL ALTE NEWS. We hope you received your new ALTE. Let us know if you didn’t. And write for us. And photograph. And draw and paint.
We’re looking at THE FUTURE in our next issue.
As for Memorial Day, even though it’s raining, Jessica and Larry and I hope enjoy yourselves. (If you’re looking for something to watch, we loved Flesh and Blood.)
Love, Esther
Esther, I knew Bobby Zimmerman. I never knew Dylan. I would run into him in the Hillel House and yes, he was "weird" - unique, I would say today. In any case, not like the other guys who hung out there and not somebody I wanted to know better at that time. What did I know? He sang at a local coffee house on Campus and that was the start for him. I ran into him once more in NY in the elevator of Columbia records. Little did I know that day that bobby zimmrman was on his way to being an icon. Look forward to catching up with you soon. xox Lainie