Last week, I heard this piece on NPR about Bob Dylan’s latest album. While I know of Dylan, I have not bee a big fan and I don’t really know his music. And what I know, I have not been wild about his voice. What caught my attention was the fact that the only interview he granted about his new CD to was AARP!
“Bob [Dylan] intentionally wanted to reach the AARP audience,” says Bob Love, editor in chief of AARP The Magazine, “and he thought that this record would be more appreciated by people who have more wisdom and experience in life.”
As a proud member of AARP, I was intrigued by this fact. The full interview is worth reading and you can listen to the short interview by clicking here. Since some of what Dylan says reinforces sage-ing, I am going to highlight a few of his comments in red:
Q: A lot of your newer songs deal with aging. You once said that people don’t retire, they fade away, they run out of steam. And now you’re 73, you’re a great-grandfather.
A: Look, you get older. Passion is a young man’s game, OK? Young people can be passionate. Older people gotta be more wise. I mean, you’re around awhile, you leave certain things to the young and you don’t try to act like you’re young. You could really hurt yourself.
A: OK, a lot of people say there is no happiness in this life, and certainly there’s no permanent happiness. But self-sufficiency creates happiness. Happiness is a state of bliss. Actually, it never crosses my mind. Just because you’re satisfied one moment — saying yes, it’s a good meal, makes me happy — well, that’s not going to necessarily be true the next hour. Life has its ups and downs, and time has to be your partner, you know? Really, time is your soul mate. Children are happy. But they haven’t really experienced ups and downs yet. I’m not exactly sure what happiness even means, to tell you the truth. I don’t know if I personally could define it.
Q: Have you touched happiness?
A: Well, we all do.
Q: Held it?
A: We all do at certain points, but it’s like water — it slips through your hands. As long as there’s suffering, you can only be so happy. How can a person be happy if he has misfortune? Does money make a person happy? Some wealthy billionaire who can buy 30 cars and maybe buy a sports team, is that guy happy? What then would make him happier? Does it make him happy giving his money away to foreign countries? Is there more contentment in that than giving it here to the inner cities and creating jobs? Nowhere does it say that one of the government’s responsibilities is to create jobs. That is a false premise. But if you like lies, go ahead and believe it. The government’s not going to create jobs. It doesn’t have to. People have to create jobs, and these big billionaires are the ones who can do it. We don’t see that happening.
And the interview goes on …
Since the interview and connection to AARP caught my attention, I bought the CD and gave it to my husband for Valentine’s Day. One of of the songs he sings is Autumn Leaves and we have a funny story that relates to that song. And that song is my favorite of the album.
I can’t say that I like it very much and I don’t really recommend buying it. But I like the fact that Dylan is targeting baby boomers and sharing his wisdom with us. It appears he has processed his life experience and he has had plenty of life experience!
Time can be our soul mate if we let it.
What if the rest of life was the best of life?
