Day Two: "But He's Fucking Bob Dylan!"

As anyone who even knows me a little will agree that I have an extreme fascination with Bob Dylan. I don't particularly love his music, though I do like it, and I am not in any way attracted to him, which isn't a stretch to believe. In fact, I can state with serious confidence that he cannot sing and he has only a marginal grasp on the harmonica. But anyone with that much notoriety, money, and that many recorded albums who can wander around New Jersey in the rain and get arrested for suspicious vagrancy in his 60s is definitely the type of person who will capture my attention.

He ran away from home several times as a wee Robert Zimmerman, not out of spite because he wasn't allowed to jump on Jimmy's trampoline, but because he just didn't feel like living at home anymore. He wanted to live in the world other people only saw on television, and make music about it, and that was pretty much the end of it. I have an extreme admiration for people who truly do not only not give a shit what other people think of them, but they almost ignore everybody else all together. He did what he wanted to do, happened to get famous for it, and didn't feel he owed anyone anything. Or at least that's the impression I've gotten from hearing him speak. He is, at the very least, 100% Bob all the damn time.

In late October, when I saw that tickets to see Bob himself live and in person were on sale for my city, I panicked. My immediate thought was "he's starting to fossilize, I absolutely have to see him live. He might be healthy now, but freak medical maladies happen, he could die before the next time he gets back around". Though not exactly a kind and noble logic, it was an honest one. So I sucked up my pride, prepared to pay $90.00 on a ticket if I had to. But miraculously, they were only $65.00. Though not a meager amount of money by any account, it was certainly a deal to me. It was a small price for to the chance to be in the presence of a man I considered to be the most fascinating person still currently alive and breathing, and even still working. I scrambled to purchase tickets two full hours after the 10:00 AM sale time, still clinging to hope that there would be a couple of nosebleed seats still available. Just for kicks, I checked the "best available" box, and was positively astonished when I was granted Standing Room Only on the floor. Not only was I going to see Bob Dylan, but if I was dedicated enough, I would actually be able to stand close enough to see up his nose.

I was not dedicated enough. In fact, I had almost no interest in doing that. I had arrived obscenely early for too many shows in my past to get close to the band, to talent, and to music and almost none of those wasted, boring hours holding my precious spot were ever worth it. Besides, my connection to Bob wasn't that kind of relationship. Sure, I have stood in line for hours in the cold with my best friend to get in the first row at a Chris Cornell concert without a hint of regret, but he's a hell of a lot better looking than Dylan. There was something mysteriously appropriate about not allowing myself too close to his greatness. I felt like it shouldn't be that easy, so I didn't allow it to be. I wanted a considerable physical distance away so I could feel he was still untouchable, and like I was experiencing something profound that a rare few get to participate in.

I'm not an idiot, I certainly knew that wasn't the case. In fact, I was sobered even more when I arrived to find only 3/4 of the medium-sized auditorium full. I was in complete disbelief that Bob Dylan didn't even sell the place out. I was baffled. As I state regularly in as a perfectly justifiable explanation in attempt to explain his greatness to others, "But he's Bob Fucking Dylan!", and I was adamant that that was more than enough to sell out a large college auditorium. But mostly, I just felt lucky that I was in a room full of people who still appreciated and recognized a truly fascinating person. Once he started performing, I was paralyzed into a trance of awe and shock. Not because he was particularly good (although he did perform better than I had expected he would), but simply because he was there. He wore a wide-brimmed hat and cast a huge, dramatic shadow on the backdrop behind him, aglow from the obnoxious spotlight upon him that would surely have been very distracting for anyone who was fully aware that there was even an audience in front of him. When he stood, he moved like an animatronic Richard Nixon in the Hall of Presidents, and croaked somewhat melodically to his extremely talented band. But he was very much still alive.

So I stared entranced for about an hour, then turned to my dad and said simply "Ok. I've had enough--let's go." I didn't need to fill myself with as much of his presence as possible, and I didn't even really need to hear anymore of his music. All I really wanted to do was see him, being Bob, once before he died. And for the same reason I wouldn't push to the front of the theater, I won't make an effort to see him again if I have another opportunity. It would ruin the perfect delusion I have that he's other-worldly and untouchable, not god-like, but in a very foreign, alternate life-form sort of way. Live long and prosper, Bob Dylan. Or at the very least, may you not get arrested for looking at old New Jersey real estate in a rainstorm.