Sunday, September 2, 2007

THINGS HAVE CHANGED / DOUBLE TAKE / HOLY LAUGHTER






















Solitary Walker's recent posts about Bob Dylan prompted me to post this ad that I came across when I picked up an AARP magazine in March or April of 2004, a time when I was seriously in need of levity. One needs to be familiar with Bob Dylan's song, "Things Have Changed," from 1999 to fully appreciate why I laughed out loud in amazement at the incongruity.

That song begins with the words:

"A worried man with a worried mind / No one in front of me and nothing behind"

and contains the bridge:

"Feel like falling in love with the first woman I meet / Putting her in a wheelbarrow and wheeling her down the street"

When I first heard that song on my way to work one day in 1999, I thought I was hearing someone doing a clumsy parody of Bob Dylan, and I felt annoyed. Soon after that, one of my younger co-workers asked if I had heard the new Bob Dylan song on the radio. Double take.

Things Have Changed video posted on YouTube

I especially like the number of times he literally "looks back" and that he enjoys every sandwich. I dreamed once that Bob Dylan and Woody Allen were the same person.

6 comments:

robin andrea said...

What a great post! I loved the video, and also how the ad made you think of the song. Connections like that are so creative and spontaneous. Wonderful.

am said...

robin andrea -- Glad you liked the post!

The Solitary Walker said...

The ad is cool. And I adore that video - have seen it many times previously. Can spend hours looking at those Dylan YouTube videos if I'm not careful. But there are only a certain number of hours in one's life! And Dylan is not God. (That's Eric Clapton, apparently!)

Loren said...

I think I would have laughed even harder at the ad if my knees weren't aching from spending the day working in the garden.

Thanks, am, I definitely needed a laugh.

am said...

solitary walker --The best answer I was ever given was in reply to a question I asked a Tibetan Buddhist teacher who asked if anyone had any questions.

Me (who shares William James' philosophy on the varieties of religious experience): Is there is a concept of God in Tibetan Buddhism?

Her: There is no God and there is no not-God.

Me: (reflective silence)

Me: (smiling) Thank you.

(I tell this story over and over again. It's just a little story.)

(Certainly clears up any confusion about Bob Dylan and Eric Clapton!)

am said...

Loren -- It's good to hear your laughter! Hope your knees are getting a good rest now. Knees are a weak point for me, too. I have to work around them when I do yoga. There is no way I could pray on my knees in a church or kneel on a surfboard. It hurts too much. I have had a tendency toward tendinitis at the front of my knees throughout my life.