THINKING ABOUT BOB DYLAN SINCE SEEING HIM SATURDAY NIGHT: I saw him in Jackson, Wyoming maybe 15 years ago. I timed my visit to see my daughter who lives there so we could see his concert which would be outdoors at the foot of an in-town mountain not the surrounding iconic Tetons. We sat on the side of the mountain. No seats. He and his band we’re down below. It was perfect. Beyond the stage was the town of Jackson framed by mountains. It looked like a movie town. The Hardy Boys could have lived there. What was different though was there were no church steeples sticking up above the leafy trees. We were in the West. Not in the old European eastern part of the country. I found that refreshing to think about then; I’ve thought about it often since. On Saturday way early for the concert as is my habit going anywhere, I walked around the corner to the side of the theater. Sure enough there was Dylan’s huge bus sitting shiny under the street lights. And sure enough when I went to the back and looked at the license plate, it was from California.

MY STILL-HURTING LEFT SHOULDER hurt even more the last two days. I mentioned it to my physical therapist today and she asked what I might have done to aggravate it. I told her a couple heavier things I had carried that might have strained it. Then it hit me what I’d done that for sure caused it to hurt. I’d cheered and clapped with arms outstretched as strong and long as I could at the Bob Dylan concert Saturday night. I stood and put my hands together as much as I could over my head like a younger me at the end. Forever Young? I guess not.

A BIG GUY WHO LOOKED LIKE HE’D once played linebacker for Nebraska walked toward the sign this morning with the light-gray hood from his sweatshirt up and a worn plaid heavy worker’s shirt on over it and said, ‘ I couldn’t agree more. Trump wouldn’t be where he is.’

After a weekend it’s good to get back on Chambers Street with the sign. You’re not supposed to look forward to Monday but I do. I like the faces I see there. Some I may have seen almost every day since I started doing this. A couple different people stopped to talk today. One woman took a picture of the sign and talked about her son and daughter. 

I JUST GOT BACK FROM MY PRINTER on the fourth floor of a building a 15-minute walk from my apt.  He gave me a proof of my newsletter which I’m finally getting around to doing. This is #62. But it’s been a long time since 61. Actually this one is an update of the last one. It’s about why I started holding the sign. For some people who see me holding it who might wonder. On the walk to the printer there were barricades everywhere. Police in big numbers on every block. Hard to get to where I was going. There’s a parade scheduled. And the president is at some event nearby. The messed-up streets and the vast security seemed hellish when I thought of him being close by.

‘I read my books with diligence, and mounting skill, and gathering certainty. I read the way a person might swim, to save his or her life.’
                               ― Mary Oliver, Upstream: Selected Essays

Now that the shoulder has been healing (at least six more months of physical therapy though) I can use both arms to hold the sign. For weeks I used just my right arm, my left arm limply hanging straight down. There was a Native American kid in my grade school in the 1950s who had an arm that was limp and hung at his side. You noticed it always. I was self-conscious about mine. Now I feel normal again, at least on that piece of the sidewalk on Chambers Street. I look forward to going back there tomorrow. I never don’t look forward to it.