Blowin' in the Wind

It was another marvelous day at school, the highlight singing John Lennon’s Imagine and Bob Dylan’s Blowing in the Wind at elementary singing time. First time for both songs. In-between classes, I had the luxury of playing some Bach English Suites on our lovely grand piano and it was just one of those in-the-zone times when the notes poured out the fingers and all the multiple conversations flowed effortlessly and linked together in their intricate ways, spinning out a larger song. I came home to my retired wife’s project of delicious cauliflower soup with hearty bread and healthy salad. And after five days of harsh rain, the sun emerged again and the world was shining.

Add them all up and by all accounts, I should have felt light and happy. But I wasn’t. Something felt just slightly off-kilter, some dark cloud was marking time, I just had this unsettled feeling that something wasn’t right and I needed something I didn’t have. And then I figured it out:

There’s a goddamn madmen about to take the reigns of our country. And signing Facebook petitions ain’t gonna turn it around.

Bob Dylan got so much right some 55 years ago, asking how there can be people who look up and can’t see the sky, people whose ears can’t hear people cry, people who turn their head and pretend they don’t see. There are people who want to lift the ban on nuclear cannonballs, who want to keep the white dove searching for rest, who are determined to roll back the hard-won freedoms of the oppressed. And they’re all being appointed to top cabinet positions.

And what are we left with? A beautiful song about imagining things that we now despair of ever happening. Another one that encourages us to find answers, but gives us no map beyond out there somewhere “blowin’ in the wind.”

I wonder if this is what the next four years will be like. Any moment of beauty and light and happiness always shaded by the Dark Lord of Mordor hovering. A constant state of feeling unsettled. Mind you, I’m not complaining in a First-World-Problem kind of way—“How dare you interrupt my perfectly-aligned biorhthythms?” But damn, it hurts to be reminded daily that the bad guys appear to be winning. I hate it.

But off to another day of kids and school tomorrow and we’ll see what’s out there blowin’ in the wind.