Dear John: Thanks for everything
Today is the 25th anniversary of the death of John Lennon. Indirectly, I owe him my life.
My parents met when my father audited a Spanish class taught by my mother at the University of Arizona. They exchanged contact information at the end of the semester but didn’t immediately get together. Then John Lennon got shot, and my mother was so depressed that she called my father, went over to his house, and didn’t leave for three days.*
When I was in junior high, I was deeply into Jim Morrison. I liked the Beatles all right, but Jim Morrison was up on my bedroom wall all bare-chested and broody. He seemed more like my kind of rock star, I guess.
If I’d known at the time how twisted up and angry John could be, I’d probably have liked him better.
When I was in Japan, I visited the John Lennon museum in Saitama. It’s owned by Yoko Ono, with the consequence that a naive visitor would come away from it with no inkling whatsoever that anyone anywhere ever disliked Yoko Ono. That doesn’t really bother me. I don’t dislike Yoko Ono. I feel like I should know more about her. There was a quote by John at the museum that said something like he’d always dreamed he’d meet an artist girl who’d understand him, and then there was Yoko.
After that, I figure, everything else makes sense–what won’t people do to be understood? That’s something to grab onto with both hands.
When I graduated college, actually, someone made me a mix CD with “Oh Yoko” on it. I really like that song. It seems so happy and devoted. It turned out to be a “like me like me LIKE ME DAMMIT” mix CD (most of them do, somehow), and I still feel kind of guilty about treating her–maybe not badly, but not carefully, either. I didn’t know her very well.
So I’m not in junior high anymore, and I think Jim Morrison is kind of silly (and a TERRIBLE poet, god). I have a couple of postcards from the John Lennon museum stuck up in my kitchen. WAR IS OVER - IF YOU WANT IT. John in his little round hipster glasses looking diffidently down on piles of dirty dishes.
Sometimes I wish the world was different, but I think I’d settle for being understood. I think John would get that.
—
*Story may be simplified or exaggerated. It is, however, MY origin myth, and I’m satisfied with it.
ETA: Never mind, my father confirms that this is pretty much how it happened.
December 9th, 2005 at 12:25 am
I myself am not a Yoko hater. I enjoy that Barenaked Ladies song that says something like, I would gladly give up musical genius, just to have you as my own personal venus. Thats pretty great. Also? My mom was 7 months pregnant with me when John Lennon was shot.
December 9th, 2005 at 4:35 am
I remember talking to my mom about John Lennon years ago, and she was like, “Oh, I remember when he was shot. It was so sad.” It was at that moment that I started seeing her as somebody other than my strangely clueless-about-pop-culture parent to be vaguely embarassed about when she didn’t understand the intricacies of early 90’s disposable culture.
But, yes. Yoko. I don’t understand some people’s intense, virulent hatred of her. The Beatles would have broken up sooner or later at that point, so there’s really no point in blaming her for it. I think she’s going to end up like Anne Sexton or Sylvia Plath, horribly underappreciated in life but she’ll be hailed as a genius when she and all the boomers who are bitter about the breakup of the Beatles are dead.
December 9th, 2005 at 10:31 am
I should lend you my Poppy Z. Brite Slashy John Lennon chapbook sometime, I’m sure you’d get a kick out of it.
On the other hand, The reigning argument in our house was Beatles v. Stones, and I must admit to being a Mick Jagger partisan.
December 11th, 2005 at 5:40 pm
Belle: Slashy John Lennon chapbook? Elaborate?
Alice: Have you seen my LJ entry about the old upstairs neighbor who hated Yoko?
Laura: Was your mom a Lennon fan?