I saved this one for the end of the week because it’s one of my personal favorites; in it, Zoë writes about her discovery of the poet and her recognition of some of his, let’s say, more challenging personality quirks.

The Bard is indeed a mystery, and Zoë tries to get to the core of that enigma. Tell us what you think. Tomorrow, we’ll conclude with my own essay, the one that started it all, as we head out to see the man himself!

The Dylan Mystery

By Zoë Wroten-Heinzmann

When I saw Bob Dylan live in 2002, I was not a fan.

The weird thing was, I wanted to like him. I had a copy of Blonde on Blonde on vinyl in my tiny collection (hidden in my closet alongside my Jack Kerouac books, both of which I neurotically thought my parents would disapprove of), although I’d never really taken the time to listen to it. I even really liked his songs - when other people sang them. Jenny in Forrest Gump moved me with her nude singing of “Blowin’ in the Wind,” and Jimi Hendrix’s version of “All Along the Watchtower” was one of my favorite lyrics. But when I went to the source and found that voice, that harmonica? Unlistenable.

In February 2002, when I was 17, my dad got some free tickets through work and asked my brother Alex and me if we’d like to join him for a concert at the Bi-Lo Center in Greenville, SC.

Alex and I had been raised in a live-music-loving household since birth. We’d been packed into Snuglis and dragged in wagons to more Downtown Alives, Bach Lunches, and outdoor festivals before the age of five than I would be able to recall even if I had yet developed the capacity for long-term memory. By the time we were teenagers, we’d seen world-class artists in diverse genres, from zydeco to blues, and we always had fun. Even bands I’d never choose to listen to at home were made better by the live experience, and I recognized this even as a kid. There was something about feeling the bass shake my internal organs, the way the sounds bounced off the buildings and streets into complex echo patterns, the energy of people sending out music into the open air that always thrilled me.

As we got older, Alex and I started being invited into our parents’ secret sanctuaries of indoor live music. They took us to see Ben Harper at the posh Peace Center for the Performing Arts. We saw Clarence “Gatemouth” Brown from a smoky corner of the BB King Blues Club on Beale Street with our father. We’d gone on a pilgrimage to the Freight Room in Atlanta to see 60s folk-rock cult figure Shawn Phillips, where we somehow were granted the enormous privilege of hanging out with him backstage while he practiced, a couple of preteens asking him questions about teaching sitar to the Beatles and playing with Donovan. Live music in these environments felt special and intimate. For a few hours we were sharing something with our parents, an audience of attentive listeners, and the musicians themselves.

The Bi-Lo Center, where Dylan was playing, was neither a smoky backroom nor an outdoor festival stage, but a real arena. This was the third, new world of live music that Alex and I were just entering in our teens. The year before, I had joined my metal-loving boyfriend to see Pantera, where my theory that seeing a live performance could elevate a band to tolerance-level, if not outright enjoyment, was tested and proved correct. Alex had gone to a Roger Waters concert, an epic and monumental taste of Pink Floyd for him.

Just a few months before the Dylan show, Alex and I had gone together to see a Tool concert in a huge outdoor arena. The spectacle was like nothing else I’d seen before: huge screens, light displays, shadowy figures crawling across the stage and the girders as a kind of silent drama element. The volume was bone-shaking. All my senses felt maxed out, overwhelmed. But most memorable was the almost-full moon, which seemed to slide across the sky to the left of the stage like a time-lapse, the droning notes of the music carrying it at warp speed.

It was in this context that I eagerly agreed to go see a musician I didn’t like. Alex and I were excited about adding to our lists of “Important Bands We’d Seen Live,” just to say we had. And, more than that, I was hoping that the magic of a live show would touch me with Dylan as it had with so many forgotten performers in genres I didn’t care about, that the spectacle of a big arena show would sweep me up and I’d be able to crack the Dylan mystery.

As it turned out, the only spectacle we were in for that night was from my dad’s drunk coworker, who spilled an entire beer into a pool on my dad’s lap as he stumbled across us to get to the bathroom. Not returning to his seat, Dad took his jacket out on a reconnaissance mission and found the guy in police custody, apparently on the verge of adding disorderliness to his drunkenness. Dad, reeking of beer, was questioned by the cops to determine his sobriety level, then they sent the coworker (and his jacket) off in a cab and my dad back to find us.

This was the most memorable thing about the whole show.

There are a few other snippets I can recall: where we were sitting in the stadium (high up to the right of the stage, so I had to turn my head to see the band), a couple of hippie girls down on the stadium floor, dancing (that arms-up swaying that my dad refers to as “the kelp dance” even works for Dylan, I guess).

But not a single moment of the music, not a single song, not even a lyric delivered with particular poignancy, stands out to me at all.

Today, I suggested to my dad and my brother that that show was the worst live music I’d ever seen. This was a bold claim - for all the good bands we’d seen in our childhood, there were many, many mediocre acts of music-store employees rocking out on their off hours. Not to mention our fair share of middle school band concerts, school talent shows, and performances by my brother’s own elementary school rock band.

The thing is, those were at least fun. The musicians were engaged, even if they weren’t great. They were putting something out there, and the audience was receiving it. The thing about Dylan on the night we saw him was, as Alex perfectly put it, “the relationship between him and mic was more important than the one between him and the audience.”

After expecting to be wowed by a big name in a big venue, getting hit with something utterly unmemorable was worse to me than listening to a bunch of 9-year-olds plunk their way through “Purple Haze.”

My dad and Alex both told me tales of concerts they’d rate as worse than the Dylan show, even though they agreed that it was certainly high on their lists. Alex told two agonizing tales of seeing obscure progressive rock bands in LA and having to wait many hours for the opening acts to start in venues that wouldn’t allow him to come back in if he left. Dylan might have been mediocre, but at least we weren’t trapped in a torture chamber of waiting.

Dad told of a Habib Koite show with a similar excruciating opening act. He was sitting in so much agony waiting for it to end that he wrote a note to my mom: “The reason why there’s pain in the world is to make time go slower; if there was no pain you’d be dead before you could enjoy anything.” Quite the opposite experience from my transcendent Tool concert when the moon flew across the sky as the hours slipped by.

Maybe what makes all these shows so bad boils down to the expectation mindset: expecting a show to start at nine and still waiting at midnight in some cramped club in LA on a weeknight, expecting opening acts not to go on for so long, expecting a certain kind of performance from Bob Dylan.

My dad laughed when he shared his story with me, because the opening act that caused him to scrawl his angsty aphorism was Oumou Sangaré, a Mailian musician that he now really likes. Even after his painful experience, he’s glad to have seen her, and has gone to see her again.

I’m glad to have seen Dylan, too.

Now that I know more about his story, I even find a lot about that show to love just for what it says about him. He was in a relationship with his mic because that’s the relationship he gave a shit about. He was just there with his voice and his harmonica and it affected him not a single bit that some 17-year-old from backwater South Carolina didn’t like it.

His relationship to his audience has been long, and fraught, and I love the fact that on that night in 2002 he gave no fucks. Who knows if he was having a bad day, or had a cold, or if the awkward seats and drunk coworker took me out of it, or if wanting to like him made it harder to actually like him, or if I just really wasn’t ready to like Bob Dylan yet. The mystery that I needed to crack about him is that I am not ever going to crack his mystery, and that’s something that I am fascinated by and in awe of now.

And the music and the lyrics were waiting for me to come to them. I might’ve wanted a big show, but what I really needed was a little more of that slow, painful time.

Tomorrow, we’ll conclude our week long celebration of Bob Dylan with my essay, Tiger Lovin’ Blues. And tomorrow evening, the family will venture the alter of the Bard himself. Cross your fingers for us that the rain stays away. On we go!

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Today, we feature two short pieces, one a prose recollection of the very special relationship of a daughter and father, and the other a short piece of fiction based on, well, the bard himself. The two pieces, by Jeff Deck and Marianne O’Connor, appeared in the chapbook I edited, Tiger Lovin’ Blues: A Bob Dylan Collection.

Marianne updated her essay exclusively for all of you today.

Their words are windows into the VERY different emotional responses fans have to Bob Dylan’s art. I hope you enjoy these moments!

Used to Care

By Jeff Deck

We waited five long weeks for the bard to arrive.

Daily we watched the nightmare riders trample the fields, burn the outlying villages, maim and murder and enslave the poor and the unconnected. We who were fortunate behind the walls of the citadel sent armed men to die in our stead. The red blades of the riders cut them like the lost harvest.

At the end of the fifth week, a lone horseman approached the citadel through the hidden ways of the wood. He knew where to dismount and wrest open the passage door, because he had been here to sing for us before.

Thirty years ago, he drove back the foul Pale Horde.

Twenty years ago, he turned the Mad Rainmaker to a chicken, when we were sure the sky would fall.

Ten years ago, he calmed our bitterest factions, on the brink of an internal war.

Now the bard appeared—to us—to be taking his time as he ambled out of the citadel-side mouth of the passage, silver-topped cane at his side.

“Did you not receive our pleas until now?” we asked him.

“I received them when they were sent,” the bard replied. “I was indisposed.”

“Did you not see the corpses stacked outside the citadel walls?” we asked him. “The storm clouds our enemies are brewing with their fell magic? The blackened foundations of homes and farms and inns?”

“I saw them,” the bard replied. “The corpses reminded me of the Horde’s victims. The clouds reminded me of the Rainmaker. The ruins reminded me of when you all turned against each other.”

We had been containing our impatience admirably, but now it spilled out. “Do you not understand, then, the price of your inaction? We needed you.“

He shrugged. “I am here. But if you no longer need me, I’ll be back on my way.”

The bard turned as if to re-enter the passage, but we caught him by the arm. It felt like pure bone underneath the thin sleeve.

“You have a power,” we demanded. “You must use it.”

The bard stroked his grey chin. “My rough music made the Horde cower. My mocking tongue undid the Rainmaker. My ballads united you fractious fools. Haven’t I used it, been used, enough?”

We swept our hands toward the ravenous armies outside the walls, the swollen maelstrom ready to burst. “We are assailed once again! We still need your song!”

At that moment the bard turned his hollow eyes to us, and we gasped. It was like looking down desolate, long-dried wells. So fixed on those twin abysses were we that we barely noticed the curl of his lips, forming a smile terrible to behold.

“How long will a carpenter build houses,” the bard asked, “if none take shelter in them? I used not to ask this question, but things have changed.”

The walls of the citadel shook. The nightmare riders called for our blood. A filthy white bolt split the skies.

And the bard unslung his lute and began to play.

May 24th

By Marianne O’Connor

On May 24th^, 2021 Bob Dylan turned eighty. On the same day, my father Gerry O’Connor turned eighty-six. My father enjoyed the celebrity of having his birthday on the same day Bob Dylan had his. Always a Dylan fan, my father was born in 1935 in Lowell, Massachusetts. His father, my grandfather Daniel O’Connor had an eighth-grade education but went on to become the president of the Lowell Five Cent Savings Bank. My grandfather sent his three children to Ivy League schools, my father went to Harvard and later received a doctorate in English Literature.

My dad read the Beats, like Allan Ginsberg and Jack Kerouac. Gerry knew Jack, sometimes Jack would appear outside his English Lit classroom on the campus of Lowell Tech in the late 60’s My father began listening to Dylan when he was a student at Harvard; a student run station on campus played jazz. During exams, the station played folk music and classical. Here, my father first heard Bob Dylan, Pete Seager, Woody Guthrie. One of his favorite folk singers was John Greenway who sang of the strife of the working man. My father likes to remind me that he got here first: “I was not born on Bob Dylan’s birthday,” he laughs, “he was born on mine.”

My father’s record collection was initially what got me into listening to the kind of rock and folk that would influence me as a young girl in the 1970’s. The collection had the usual Beatles and Beach Boys, Carole King and Joan Baez. But there were Bob Dylan albums along with albums from Odetta, Billie Holiday (those records were thick!), Gordon Lightfoot and Peter Paul and Mary. This was the soundtrack of my youth.

In 1969 my father took me to my first concert at Lowell Technical Institute; The Band with Levon Helm. I was five, but I still remember the members of the band glowing in their spotlights. I painted a picture of it that my father mounted on his campus office. My father sided with student demonstrators who voiced their outrages over the Vietnam War. He could have lost his job at Lowell Tech, but he believed in their struggle and loss. It was part of his loss too.

An assignment my father gave to his incoming freshmen students was a writing prompt: write about your cultural heroes. Over the course of time the “heroes” would shift, Larry Bird, Bobby Orr, etc. My father explained to the students that his cultural hero was Bob Dylan. Dylan has had a profound influence on American pop-culture. He is the stuff of legend. As a society, we will not be able to measure the profound influence on every singer/songwriter he inspired until his time has passed. Even then, his music will live on forever, influencing generations to come.

J.S. Ondara is one such singer/songwriter with an amazing story, inspired by Bob Dylan. Born in Kenya, Ondara wrote poetry and songs as a boy, but didn’t play an instrument. His family could not afford one. He once told a friend that he loved Guns-n -Roses because of their original song “Knocking on Heaven’s Door.” The friend corrected him, told him Bob Dylan wrote that song. This was the moment Ondara first learned of Bob Dylan. From that point on, Ondara’s obsession with Bob Dylan would change the direction of his life.

Ondara absorbed all he could about Dylan, reading and memorizing almost everything in Dylan’s enormous catalog. He believed he had to move to the United States and write music. In 2013 he immigrated to the U.S. and chose Dylan’s home state of Minnesota to call his new home. He learned guitar and began uploading some cover songs to YouTube. Soon he was talking to record producers and was signed to the Verve Forecast record label. His 2019 debut album “Tales of America” was nominated for a Grammy for Best Americana Album.

Dylan paved the way for many artists and musicians to speak out against civil rights injustices and social inequality. He was not just a talented poet and writer, to me he was a magician. He could transform. He could make you believe and hope that the crumbling world around you was on the brink of revolution. Dylan was the collective conscience of our radical times.

Happy birthday Mr. Zimmerman. You inspire faith and bring me to tears every time I hear “Blowin’ in the Wind.” Happy birthday Dad, thank you for introducing me to American folk music and the magical poetry of Bob Dylan.

Addendum…

On May 24, 2026, Bob Dylan turned eighty-five, marking a significant milestone. In 2023, Gerry reached eighty-eight but passed away a few months later.

Gerry not only introduced me to Bob Dylan, The Band, The Clancy Brothers, and Pete Seeger, but he also introduced me to hiking in the White Mountains of New Hampshire when I was a teenager. Hiking changed my life. Gerry used to hike with the guys, and soon enough, I was hiking with “The Guys” too, and could keep up. During one of the first hikes , we visited Carter Notch Hut, where I learned about the ghost of Red Mac. Whenever I hiked with Gerry, I heard unusual stories, which eventually inspired me to publish Haunted Hikes of New Hampshire in 2008.

Gerry was proud to be a part of a new adventure of promoting book sales! He made sure he was part of it.

In 2014, while filming a segment of *Windows to the Wild* for NHPTV, Gerry joined me on an adventure to hike with the show’s legendary host, Willem Lange. Our plan was to meet at the Coppermine Brook Trailhead near Cannon Mountain and hike to a mysterious marker dedicated to Arthur Farnsworth—a ghostly spirit known, according to legend, as “The Keeper of Stray Ladies.” Farnsworth, who was once married to Bette Davis, lived with her in Sugar Hill, where the couple had first met and fallen in love at the very site where the marker was later placed. Poor Farny suffered a tragic death on Hollywood Boulevard, soon, a mysterious marker appeared in the brook.

Gerry joined the fun, and we all met early at the trailhead one summer morning to greet the film crew and Willem Lange. Gerry and Willem hit it off immediately, as if they were old hiking buddies. As they compared stats and reminisced, they realized they were both born in 1935. When the two men reached into their pockets to pull out their driver’s licenses, they discovered they were birthday twins—both born on May 24, 1935, with Willem hailing from Vermont and Gerard from Massachusetts.

When he passed away, I made sure to let Willem know.

I think of Gerry every day; he meant the world to me. It is impossible to measure the profound impact he had not only on my life, but on so many others. Because of him, I took risks I might otherwise have avoided and found adventure at every turn. Gerry began losing his vision in his forties to aggressive glaucoma, yet even when he was totally blind, he continued to hike, guided by his poles. Throughout each stage of his life—as a hopeful Harvard graduate, a devoted father, and a dedicated academic—the music, poetry, and words of Bob Dylan were a constant companion.

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In typical Dylan fashion, he didn’t attend the award ceremony, only picking up his medal a few months later on a tour swing through Sweden. Standard stuff for him.

So today, we’ll feature five poems about Dylan, four that appeared in the chapbook I edited, Tiger Lovin’ Blues: A Bob Dylan Collection. One is from a Buffalo author and Dylan fan who sent it to me this week!

The poets, Chuck Joy, Cathy Gigante-Brown, Kaela Law, Loretta Brady and P.A. Kane, are all friends of Day By Day and writers true. Their words paint VERY different intimate responses to the life, words and influence of Bob Dylan.

The five poems in a row illustrate just how deeply feelings can run when it comes to Dylan’s life and work.

Take your time, don’t go through these fast. Savor them. Read these out loud if you can - from five wonderful poets, celebrating, scolding, chilling with and recalling the Bard! When you’re finished, and if you have questions or would like to be in contact with the poets’ socials, just ask in the comments!

So Deeply True

By Chuck Joy

Bob Dylan said that,

he also said that,

what didn’t he say?

really he writes

some what he writes

rings so deeply true

people name their child Dylan,

even we who name our child

Laura or Neil feel Bob Dylan’s music

to the bone

I have come awake

dreaming Idiot Wind, singing in my sleep

one girl calls Tangled Up In Blue

her favorite song

a poet I know makes it a point

reciting the lyrics to Dylan songs

as part of every show

and always Tom Thumb’s Blues

I hear our Bob won a Nobel Prize

they call it rock and roll

For Mr. Zimmerman,

On the Occasion of His 80th Birthday

By Catherine Gigante-Brown

Please silence

your cat-strangled-by-a-clothesline voice.

Please put to bed

your bedhead.

It’s time to lay to rest

your weary head

that can’t remember the lyrics

you once wrote

when your eyes were bluer than robin’s eggs.

For now they’re clouded with age,

rage

and dollar signs.

It’s your choice

just like it’s mine

not to buy your records

and to have Alexa

change the station

when you come on the radio.

I will not pay another cent

to hear you gargle live in concert.

I will not give you another moment

of my time

after I finish with this rhyme.

For even legends need to know

when it’s time to go.

If I Met Bob Dylan

By P.A. Kane

If I met Bob Dylan

I would bum a smoke from him

Even though I don’t smoke

But I’d want to play it cool

So as to not come off bad

If he didn’t have a smoke or quit

I’d make small talk about how

I can’t seem to give them up

But if he had one

I’d smoke with Bob Dylan

And, we’d talk of common things

Like the weather

Or baseball

Or the price of coffee

A real nothing conversation

I’d ask after his family

And tell him about my dog

And in a passing moment

During this nothing conversation

Our eyes might meet

And in that passing moment

In a cool understated way

I would try to convey

The love, gratitude and affection

I have for him

And hopefully he would receive it

Without feeling weird or awkward

That’s what I would do

Nothing more, nothing less

If I met Bob Dylan

Puck and Fern in New York

By Loretta L.C. Brady

Whiskey and Bourbon have had their say since

before the pandemic. But of course since then

things have been - even more pronounced.

Adding the bitters brought out the profile and

The terror in the sky had already led us

To see so many things fall down before our eyes.

I remember then, you gave me $500 to cover -

I can’t even recall what! I only remember the denim.

And the shame at my gratitude,

of which even you were embarrassed.

Crossing in front of the Duane Reade on 14th

and hoping our bond would bind,

You told me stories of SEC fines and Chinese food traditions.

A tour guide through a world I wouldn’t know I’d know.

That pride, holding space. A Ranger’s Fan and a Fern

Finding a way through the catholic priests defiling.

The last text you sent I didn’t reply...

I Went Off Birth Control Because of Bob Dylan

By Kaela Law

As a teenager

I thought I was a feminist.

In my 1990s high school I would look around and know that I was better than all these boys.

I was tough

And smart.

I was interested in things better than kissing.

I was called a Lesbian.

At home my mother raised me up on watching afternoon Soaps and Oprah, and I thought

To Hell With Getting Married!

And yet I was on birth control, because in the 90s we were all on birth control. Sex was everywhere on TV. But I wasn’t having sex, I wasn’t even kissing.

And yet, I was on birth control because the doctors and health teachers and parents said to.

And we all said to each other that it was to regulate our periods.

Taking Birth Control Pills was taking charge of our bodies. Feminism was taking birth control.

As a teenager I wasn’t happy.

I withdrew into music.

My uncle let me pick through all his old albums one day in Spring.

They were boxed down in his basement. It was dark and smelled like damp cement, and old plastic from the vinyl records. The smell was vintage.

I emerged from that cellar with Dylan’s Desire under my arm. I first listened to Bob Dylan in the spring sunshine.

And the world was good.

I got Bob Dylan’s Greatest Hits CD for pennies from that Columbia House mail-in sheet.

On the CD cover was a silhouette of Dylan playing harmonica, with the stage lights

shining through his hair.

I listened to that album and was transported through time, back to the 60s. That album was a daydream of freedom.

I was born in the wrong time, I thought

I should have been a hippie in the 60s

That daydream was a poignant Dylan-flavored romance.

“The Times They Are A-Changin’” was my anthem.

I wanted to protest

I wanted to be part of a movement, a hopeful era.

A make-believe world so I didn’t have to feel the pressures of being a real teenager in the 90s

But our 90s were tame.

Except Everyone was having sex of course, not the free-love of the hippies, but crass

EXPLICIT LYRICS rap album type sex

Even President Clinton was having sex in the oval office with an intern and a cigar

I didn’t want to be in the 90s, learning about AIDS when I was twelve years old.

I wanted the sweet and simple – flower power and peace.

And then I got angry. No self-respectable 90s kid would grow up and not be angry at the world.

Fuck the hippies.

Fuck them, man, and their whole generation of freedom; shackling us ‘cause they sold out.

I wanted a visceral experience to impress upon the shape of the world. I wanted to fight for justice, but nothing in my life was unjust. People were just going about their days

making money, spending money

Sending their kids to college. That was my horizon.

“Expand your mind”

Does not mean a good college education

I wanted to be defiant.

It was the 90s. I listened to Rage Against The Machine as well as Dylan

Juxtapose ‘Testify’ with ‘Blowin’ in the Wind.’

I read Rolling Stone Magazine to be cool and current.

I came across a Bob Dylan interview.

He talked about birth control.

He talked about what a big manipulation it was, getting all these girls to swallow all these pills.

My eyes grew wide, and then

I went off birth control.

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Chris and I go back a few years and the essay you’re about to read appeared (as everything I’ll publish this week) in the chapbook I edited in 2021, Tiger Lovin’ Blues: A Bob Dylan Collection.

This week-long series will conclude with my own essay on Saturday, the day that my family will finally get to see Bob Dylan live in Laconia!

I wanted to give you all this essay off the front end of the week because Chris so perfectly encapsulates the raw enchantment of what being a disciple of Bob Dylan actually entails. How it changes you. What the poet means (or can come to mean) to those that listen. Really listen.

I’ll let Chris take over from here!

Walking with Bob, Together Through Life

By Christopher DiLoreto

It is 1999. A montage plays out on the TV screen – NBC – as I sit on the couch, fifteen years old and transfixed. It begins with the attempted misdemeanor arrest of a black man in Chicago that quickly escalates into a full-blown race riot. Meanwhile, young Julia Stiles is giving birth, estranged from her parents, the emerging child’s hippie father nowhere to be found, and she is SCREAMING and crying. Her father, unaware of this, is shown feeling regret. One of her brothers is wandering around New York with a broken heart after the love of his life left him for a bearded radical Jeremy Sisto. Her other brother is in Vietnam in the middle of the jungle, spraying machine gun fire and losing his mind. Back in the race riots, a black preacher races to find his son among the looters, admonishing him, taking the gun and stolen TV from his arms – and ends up shot dead by police.

This is the climactic scene that concludes the first of two parts of the made-for-TV miniseries The 60s. It’s largely now forgotten, perhaps owing to the fact that the 60s nostalgia that reached its zenith around 1999 has now reached a nadir – there is no Wikipedia page for this film, nor is possible to stream it – but for many reasons it shouldn’t be. The sheer raw emotion of this scene was seared into my young brain; it’s possible I’ve never shaken it. At minimum, we can say that I’ve never shaken the song I heard coming from the TV or the artist singing it.

Playing during all this human drama – in full, no less – was “Like a Rolling Stone.”

Surely, I had heard it before, in the background somewhere, maybe in the car on Oldies 103, but I hadn’t really heard it until now. I was really blown away. That unbridled fury, the openness of the scorn; sure, maybe its message, which boils down to “You reap what you sow – and I told you so” is undeniably self-righteous, but when delivered with that authoritative voice, backed by that combo of piano and organ, the unflinching guitar and drums of harmonica, the self-righteousness itself cannot be denied.

This was Bob Dylan? No wonder his name seemed to pop up so much.

So began my education. From “Mr. Tambourine Man,” I learned as a sensitive and often forlorn teenager how to begin walking the lesser-known paths I’m still on today. I made that deal, and stuck to it. From “Subterranean Homesick Blues” I came to understand there was another world underground and from “I Want You” I discovered that sometimes (especially when young), you just want someone, against all reason and sense and circumstance, maybe even against any ethics.

I learned from “Blowin’ in the Wind” and “The Times They Are A-Changin’” that many of us strive to understand this life and make it better, and that we can neither fully grasp nor fully control this process; from “The Hurricane” I learned about how the justice system really works.

“Like a Rolling Stone” still floors me, but if you walk with Dylan, as you yourself grow and change, the Dylan you need appears before you. As I advanced in age, through my late 20s and early 30s, Dylan again found me through The Band – his band – when I discovered he was responsible for so many of the words on Music From Big Pink. In “Tears of Rage”, the boys channel their sometime leader’s vision of struggle with America and entropy; so it goes in many ways with “This Wheel’s On Fire.” Unsurprisingly given how trapped I often felt during this time in life, “I Shall Be Released” became my anthem and my hymn.

I fell in love with The Basement Tapes and from there fell backward into the deep cuts of Blonde on Blonde. I swooned, and still swoon, over the smirking, frustrated-but-unyielding complications of “One of Us Must Know (Sooner or Later)” and “Stuck Inside of Mobile with the Memphis Blues Again.” The former has, I still insist, the best piano part of any Dylan tune and the latter, with its nine epic verses and unparalleled wordplay (not to mention at least a hint of the scorn that had hooked me in the first place).

Once my first marriage ultimately collapsed, I found I suddenly understood how “Sad-Eyed Lady of the Lowlands” and “Sara” could devolve into “Idiot Wind.” And I think you need at least 30, 35 years under your belt before you really get “Shelter From the Storm,” “Simple Twist of Fate,” and “Tangled Up in Blue.”

Similarly, as my life came to pass every few years through increasingly definitive phases, as I had to leave people and places and ways of being behind, I came to get – again and again – “My Back Pages.”

Twenty one years ago, I thought “Changing of the Guards” was a super cool apocalyptic tune. Now, exactly sixteen years (six-teen-years!) into my life in New Hampshire, it plays like a description of the world before me.

Most starkly, I always hated “Forever Young” because I thought it was corny as hell and because I’ve never found youth, at least as commonly understood, to be particularly desirable. Until just last summer. I was driving on my way to a mini-pilgrimage and accidentally listened to an old cover by the Jerry Garcia Band and broke down in tears and knew it to be one of the best, purest blessings ever, ever put to song. Probably, it’s no coincidence that I am now a father of sons, and the song is written by a father for his son (though it may also be no coincidence that as my aging body ceases to be able to do as it once did, I no longer harbor any scorn of my own for youth).

I love all of his later albums, too, but experience has now left me certain that I will enjoy them even more as I step into the later stages of my own life, perhaps even after he has left us here, bereft, to settle our mortal affairs ourselves. But that’s his gift to us, to our lives, our whole lives.

People who find Dylan inscrutable simply haven’t lived into understanding him. And people who call him reclusive and mysterious are merely frustrated that he doesn’t come when we call. That isn’t his way and it isn’t his role – but the truth is that he’s actually given hundreds of interviews over the years. In at least one, he’s hinted that what he does and says in life and music is directed by God. Most other times in my life, I would dismiss a suggestion like this as insane or arrogant or silly or ignorant; now I take it for granted as true. (And perhaps it’s no coincidence that I am right now very close to Dylan’s own age when he entered his famous heavy Christian period.)

Hunter Thompson dedicated Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas in part “to Bob Dylan, for Mister Tambourine Man” – and he had that spot on. Perhaps Dylan wasn’t born the Tambourine Man, but he certainly became him. He accepted the bargain and he followed and he assumed the role. Now it’s me standing in those ancient, empty streets, chasing a shadow of something that Dylan himself actually sees. But I’ve accepted the deal, too. All my life, he’s played the song for me – and the least I can do is follow.

For more info on Chris, his writing and socials, please just let us know in the comments and we or he will drop in a bunch of links!

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Welcome to National Bob Dylan Appreciation and Frustration Week.

That’s not a real thing, but we’re making it so right here. Why? Because on Saturday, Little Bean will see the great poet live for the first time. She will be able to both appreciate him and be frustrated by him, as are we all.

You see, Dylan walks to his own beat. Reviews from this tour are full of fans being irritated that Bob Dylan is being, well, Bob Dylan. He wears a hoodie. He doesn’t allow pictures. He doesn’t talk to the crowd. He plays deep cuts instead of ‘Like a Rolling Stone’ for the millionth time. (This last thing I’m really looking forward to.)

To celebrate, we’ll be running a few stories and poems from Tiger Lovin’ Blues: A Bob Dylan Collection, a chapbook that I edited and released with the help of Peterborough poet Bill Chatfield back in May 2021.

That collection is out of print and I have no more copies in my inventory, so this is as good a place and time as any to publish some of those pieces.

Let’s begin with Bill himself. The great poet passed away in 2022 but his Peterborough Poetry Project was the outfit that published the chapbook.

Does anyone here have any memories/stories to tell about Bob Dylan?

Here’s Bill’s poem. Enjoy!

Misconstruing Dylan

By Bill Chatfield

Thinkin’ of Dylan in the 60s,

I had almost nothin’ to say

struck lots of true chords early on

but then, hey…lay, lady, lay

—

I know I’m not fair to the man

he deserves his long-lived fame

just lost interest as he wandered

and I plain forgot his name

—

but

now and then I hear a song

/desolation row or hurricane/

reminds me that he knows

how to hit the nail

in a world

that’s full of pain.

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The other day, three lads dropped into the library, young men we hadn’t seen before. Two of them had small backpacks and all three carried Bibles. They looked tired and were very polite.

They needed directions to Exeter, a town about 20 miles away from us.

I offered to give them a GPS tag for their phones that they could follow.

“We don’t have phones,” the one fellow said.

“We’re not driving,” said the other.

Turns out, they also didn’t have a detailed map, or food, or decent footwear. They were on a Bible pilgrimage they explained, from their church in Manchester. They were walking from Manchester to Exeter, maybe about 30 miles by car. It was two in the afternoon and they had made it to Auburn. That meant that, depending on where they had started, they had already walked about 10 miles.

Outside, it had begun to rain.

“The highway is the fastest,” one said, “but we can’t walk on the highway.”

On a personal note, it’s worth pointing out that I actually support hiking pilgrimages like this. Regardless of your reasons for doing them - church, charity, connection to the outdoors - they are worth doing and I’ve done them.

I’ve walked across England, to Mt. Everest Base Camp, through Mt. Rushmore, across the Presidential Range. And in all those cases, I’ve come home exhausted, cut up, sun burned and sore - but also re-energized and better in touch with my physical and mental self. And happier.

So I get it.

The difference though? I didn’t just step out my door to walk 30 miles with zero directions or preparation. With no Plan B. With no way to contact someone if things go sideways. Imagine walking 10 miles with no clue where you’re going and coming upon a public library where you walk in and ask for directions on how to walk the remaining 20 miles?

“Can I call you an Uber?” I ask them.

“We’re walking,” one said. “Besides, we have no money.”

With or without our help, they were heading out the door. So, we went over possible routes. There’s a rail trail that goes toward Exeter. We gave them directions to that. We jotted down some side roads that they could take that would wind their way down that they could walk on. We warned them of walking along state routes.

We loaded them up with snacks and water and let them use the bathroom.

On their way out, one told us that Jesus loves us and blesses us. I suggested that given their ambitions, it might be them that would need the blessings. Off they went.

As they milled about our picnic bench outside before starting to walk, I called the non-emergency line at our local police department. Maybe I was overstepping? The boys had done nothing wrong. It was raining but not cold. They were young.

I explained to the dispatcher, whom I knew personally, that they did nothing wrong, but I wanted the PD to be aware of them and their non-plans. But by the time an officer arrived, the boys were gone.

“I feel bad for calling you,” I told him.

“I understand,” he said. “You were worried about them. Do you know which church this was?”

I had never thought to ask. I should have.

The incident has stayed in my head now for a few days. I wish I had a clearer understanding of the guidelines behind such a ‘pilgrimage.’ But then again, maybe I’m just old. Maybe the dad in me just took over. This isn’t wilderness out here.

Maybe just stepping out your door and going for a long walk to another town should be more normal, not less. In other parts of the world, it is. There’s a freedom to that, I suppose, a careless, risky freedom, but still…

A few days later, my good friend Paul stopped at the library. Paul is a man of the church and good conversationalist so I told him the story. He nodded along. He understood, and had heard of such church-based faith pilgrimages before.

He explained the idea of such a walk may have been to provide the boys with the humility and humbleness of having nothing (the ‘least’ among us, which if I recall comes from Matthew) and also to show that there are, indeed, good people out there. Not good Christians or Atheists. Good humans.

“You were part of their story,” he said. “They stopped at the library, you offered them food and directions. Exactly the point, maybe, of what they were doing.”

“But I was angry at them for taking such risks,” I said.

“You weren’t angry, you were anxious and worried about them, there’s a difference.”

I admit I had no response to that. Paul’s a smart guy.

“Then again, maybe it’s just teenagers doing things teenagers do.” Paul shrugged.

Fair enough. My father would have died of anxiety had he known about some of my episodes.

No plans. No clue how to get to your destination. No back up. You just start walking. Like Caine from Kung Fu. See what happens. Pick up some snacks at a random library. Keep going till you get to... someplace. Throw your well being into the hands of strangers. Pretty Biblical stuff all that.

I’m not sure if the boys made it. If they hadn’t and something bad happened, I suppose we would have heard about that. So they made it to someplace. Exeter? Who knows. Maybe the destination wasn’t the point. Maybe it was like the Walk for Peace those Buddhist monks took last fall - it’s not about arriving, it’s how you get there.

I’ll leave you with a quote from The Philosophy of Walking by Frédéric Gros, who said: Slowness means cleaving perfectly to time, so closely that the seconds fall one by one, drop by drop like the steady dripping of a tap on stone. This stretching of time deepens space. It is one of the secrets of walking: a slow approach to landscapes that gradually renders them familiar. Like the regular encounters that deepen friendship.

How about you? Have you ever gone on a pilgrimage? Did it change you? Would you do it again? Tell us about it.

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Today’s book spotlight turns to one of the library’s favorite subjects… dinosaurs! Obviously, dinosaurs are our favorite because we’re home to Stella the Stegosaurus, our 12 foot long Pavilion Park mascot and head dino educator!

But also because the newest board book that we’ve added to our collection is ABC of Dinosaurs: A Powerfully Prehistoric Alphabet. This delightful board book, published by Cottage Door Press, offers a literal letter by letter dino library, with a pronunciation guide and a tid-bit about each dino listed.

The book also is tactile, with each dino raised up on the pages so the little readers can feel the teeth of their favorite creature.

While the author, Carmine Falcone, is a publisher editorial pseudonym, the illustrator, Isabella Grott, is a well known Italian artist and her dinosaurs pop off the pages in vibrant action poses. In some case, the dinos even interact with the very letters of their name in the alphabet. The whole concept is clever!

Finally, adults can learn from the book as well. For example, I had no idea there was a dinosaur that begins with the letter Z. The Zephyrosaurus looks like a mini-T-Rex and apparently made its home by borrowing into the ground. Now you know!

The new board book, ABC of Dinosaurs: A Powerfully Prehistoric Alphabet, is on our shelves and ready to be checked out. (If it isn’t already, but you can put a hold on it!) So, check it out!

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We wanted to make mention today of some exciting news for Little Bean. (Well, for me too, but extra exciting for her!)

The NY City-based magazine and media group, The Concert Chronicles, has picked up Interviews By Uma as a featured interview series. I’ll also be doing some occasional feature writing for them. Our focus for the magazine will, of course, be music.

Here’s a link to her first interview at The Concert Chronicles, which was posted yesterday:

Uma's Interview at Concert Chronicles

This is, of course, another super building block for my daughter’s growing writing resume. Besides regular features in local media like Manchester Ink Link and Paperjam Magazine, she’s also been published in Canada at the Summerland Review, The Daily Courier, The Morning Star and The Kalowna Capital News.

Her first feature at The Concert Chronicles dropped yesterday, which was her interview with the LA-based pop/punk band Turning Jane. She currently has a handful of other interviews in the works and you can follow along with those over at her own newsletter here:

INTERVIEWS BY UMA

An 11-year-old little rocker's personal site for interviews with bands, musicians, artists and writers!

By Dan Szczesny

Meantime, I’m working on a feature for The Concert Chronicles on one of my own favorite bands, Velvet Rush. The German classic rock band is making waves, just signed to a label and has a new album coming out.

While we know that Uma’s music writing journey isn’t for everyone, I hope you’ll allow me the opportunity to dad-out on how proud I am of the work she puts in and that it’s starting to be recognized!

Anyway, please do go give all those outlets some likes and shares and we’ll get to work! Let’s go!

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Fishing Lessons

By Faith Senie

The trout hides in the ripples, the bass among the reeds

Cast your lure too close to shore, the hook snags in the weeds

We never really talked that much – your job got in the way

But your quiet fishing lessons, I still remember them today

—

Vacation time was special, your free times always few

Pack up the camper, hit the road to some place far and new

A stream, a lake, the ocean, the water drew you in

Rod and reel and fisherman, on the hunt for scale and fin

—

A small boat, smaller motor, we’d rent them for the day

Our lunches packed, we’d hop aboard, head out across the bay

Mom would read her novel, content to just be there

You’d bring out the fishing poles, your good one and your spare

—

You’d eye the lake, its banks, its shape, what stood upon its shores

You’d open up the tackle box and contemplate its stores

Out would come some odd-shaped thing; you’d tell me how it worked

And off we’d go to find a spot where you knew fishes lurked

—

The boat would stop along the shore at a place like all the rest

And you’d explain what made you know that this place was the best

The shallow rocks, the lily pads, the shade oak high and wide

You knew just what to look for that marked where fish could hide

—

You’d point out all the features, tell me where to cast, and why

Then we’d settle down to fishing, and let those lures fly!

Fishing is a silent sport; fish flee from lots of noise

And listening to nature is one of my great joys

—

The sound of water lapping against the nearby shore

Sparrows chirping in the trees, a distant hawk, and more

Mother’s pages turning, the buzz of casting reel

The contented smile on your face gives voice to how you feel

—

And tucked within the silence, your lessons seemed so small

Patience, stillness, simple things (it’s fishing, after all)

Lures don’t always go to where you aim for when you cast

But that doesn’t mean there are no fish in the places it comes past!

—

If your lure gets no nibbles, try another one

Moving shadows startle fish; stay angled to the sun

And if, when day is over, there’s been no fish upon your line,

Stop some place for dinner – the fishing still was fine!

—

The trout hides in the ripples, the bass among the reeds

Cast your lure too close to shore, the hook snags in the weeds

We never really talked that much – your job got in the way

But your quiet fishing lessons, I still remember them today

Faith Senie is a writer and musician living in New Hampshire, and one half of the dream-inspired folk duo, Dan & Faith. Faith was raised in Cooperstown, NY, where she began playing piano at an early age. She sang in her school choir, was an accompanist for school shows and concerts, and also took to acting. The duo got their musical start in New England and now travel throughout the U.S. and Canada in a camper-van packed with instruments and sound gear as they bring their music and stories to coffeehouses, festivals, libraries, house concerts, and other listening rooms.

Their tour schedule is extensive, including an August 22 date at my library, Griffin Free Public Library! You can find more music and words by Faith at the duo’s website here: Dan and Faith Senie

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In Chicago last week, at the American Library Association annual conference, I had the unique opportunity to be both an author and a librarian. I say I had the opportunity, as opposed to actually taking advantage of that opportunity!

I missed out on doing a signing because I didn’t realize - until I got to the Expo Center - that my guidebook publisher was in attendance!

Ah well, I’m new to all this. Next year I’ll take a closer look at the vendor list before hand. This did give me the chance to actual meet face to face Globe Pequot Publishing Publicity Manager Sadie Trombetta who was running their booth. I’ve been in touch with Sadie over the months, but never met her in person.

She showed me around a little and we chatted about my book, Hiking Fire Towers New York: A Guide to the State’s Best Lookout Tower Hikes.

Had either of us known we’d be there, we could have brought copies of my book and set up a signing table. Still, it was fun to make in-person connections.

The conference certainly gave me plenty of stories to write and memories to turn into stories and that’s what I’ll do in the weeks that follow, maybe once or twice a week. If y’all are lucky, we’ll have a new book review find by Uma for an upcoming post!

I was asked a few times at the conference what my next book will be and that’s a tough one to answer, of course. I have lots of ideas, but very little time. And since my primary publisher went under, my main priority has been to resecure the PDFs of my old books and figure out whether it’s worth self-publishing or looking for a new press. Uma and I DO have plans - someday - for a Vol 3 of our Rocks Guide Series.

But for now, this little space serves its purpose. Plus, all of you had some pretty interesting ideas the other day on topics to write about!

So, we forge on into July! Keep reading, and hiking!

Tomorrow! The poets take over. We’ll present a lovely poem by Day By Dayer and musician Faith Senie. You won’t want to miss that!

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Ringo Starr turns 86 years young today and by the time you’re reading this - around noon every year on his birthday - it might be Peace & Love time.

For years now, he’s asked his fans at noon on his birthday, wherever they may be, to express in video, music or words, that simple expression of, well, Peace & Love.

His social media is absolutely packed with videos and messages from people around the world singing or shouting or writing Peace & Love. You can do the same with the hashtag #peaeandlove.

So that’s what we’re doing today.

And the timing couldn’t be better. He just announced an east coast tour yesterday. With luck, Little bean will get to see Ringo Starr in person.

That would mean that in the last year and a half, she would have gotten to see Angus Young play guitar, Bob Dylan play piano and Ringo Starr play drums.

A few decades from now, when she’s introducing music to her kids, maybe she’ll recall these days. I hope she will.

Ringo just put out a new album last month by the way, chock full of collabs with incredible blue grass musicians like Molly Tuttle and Billy Stings. Sheryl Crow and St. Vincent also show up. “Long Long Road” is pretty good actually. Not bad for an 86 year old’s 22nd studio album.

Here’s the music video to the song “Long Long Road.” Warning: The video is heavy on the nostalgia so you might want to have some tissues nearby.

Anyway, as we navigate what sometimes feels like an world full of landmines and uncertainty, I can think of worse things to express than Peace & Love.

So, today, wherever you are, at just about noon, give it a try. Write it down and pin it to your fridge. Call a friend and shout it over the phone. Tell us in the comments. Film a video and hashtag it, who knows, maybe Ringo will post it.

Ready? Three, two one…

PEACE & LOVE friends, PEACE & LOVE!

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Today, a one off special for subscribers here at Day By Day!

As many of you may know, one of the highlights of this community has been watching my co-writer grow into quite the interviewer. Over the past year and a half or so, she’s interviewed 15 bands, musicians or artists for her column, Interviews By Uma.

For the most part, we’ve been thrilled both by how kind and receptive the interviewees have been, as well as how high and positive the engagement has been from readers like you! So thank you!

A couple weeks ago, Uma decided that it was time for Interviews By Uma to have its own space, a thematic Substack where music and arts fans could drop in to catch just her interview work, which has averaged out to be a monthly or so post.

So, together we built her a space. All her previous interviews are archived there. And today, we’re premiering her first NEW Interviews By Uma, this time with the fabulous LA-based pop/punk band Turning Jane!

So, just for today, because we want to make sure all of you are aware and hopefully some of you wish to subscribe, we’re simply letting you know and dropping you a link so you can go check it out yourself!

Future interviews will be available strictly at that site and available to Interviews By Uma subscribers.

So, are you ready Give her new site a look over and tell us what you think! Please share, and thank you all so much! Here it is!

INTERVIEWS BY UMA

Interviews By Uma: Turning Jane

LA ‘baddies’ Turning Jane is ready to turn some heads with new music and a new attitude…

Read more

10 days ago · Uma Szczesny

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I remember the Bicentennial.

Sort of.

I was nine. We didn’t do any traveling and I only remember driveway sparklers.

The 1976 American Freedom Train actually passed through Buffalo NY on its 140 city tour, but never made a display stop there. I remember my uncle grumbling about having to drive to see it. I looked that up. He was right. Buffalonians would have had to drive to Rochester or Albany to see the inside of the museum train.

(Sidenote: The train was touring from April 1975 through December 1976 and it DID make a stop in my current hometown of Manchester, NH. I’ll do a story about that someday. Among the 500 treasures of American culture aboard the train were Judy Garland’s dress from The Wizard of Oz and a moon rock.)

(Sidenote, sidenote: There was also a post-World War 2 Freedom Train that was - gasp - integrated, allowing blacks and whites to mingle together on the train. Alabama and Tennessee refused to allow integration. Some ‘Freedom,’ huh? Freedom Train officials simply cancelled their planned stops there.)

(Triple sidenote: In May 0f 2023, the American Freedom Train 250 Foundation was created to get a train running for 2026. They began raising money as no government funding was offered. In February of this year, the locomotive actually fired up for a test run. Three months later, last May, the foundation announced it had shut down as they were unable to raise any business sponsorships. Take this as you wish.)

Anyway, back when us kids gathered on my front stoop along with my cousin Anne, who was dressed like Betsy Ross, we didn’t know any of that. All we knew was that we were eating hot dogs and hamburgers that day and lighting up a whole bunch of sparklers.

In school, earlier that year, our school play was some sort of Polka dance where we wore red, white and blue cowboy hats. I recall there being some kind of special stamp that my mother got and they printed commemorative quarters as well.

And that was sort of it for me. I hadn’t yet visited Boston or Philadelphia. I hadn’t read any actual scholarship about the Revolution or Colonial Days so I was still flying under the Catholic elementary school banner of the wildly mythologized history of our country.

In other words, back in 1976 I was ONLY celebrating my country’s freedoms.

Fifty years later, I’m also aware that those freedoms are - still - not universal.

My dear friend Lydia asked me yesterday if there was a way to write about our 250th birthday that “isn’t a saccharine denial of reality, but which also doesn’t leave me sad about the state of things.”

Lydia is smart. That’s a challenging ask.

Can I take a rain check? Because I need to think about that a bit more.

For today, I’ll stick with nine-year-old me, my little sister at my side, all us kids lined up and spinning our sparklers. And as I write this, just a few hours ago in my current driveway, my daughter and her group of friends did the same exact thing.

Her laughter, like mine fifty years ago. My dog at my side back then, like her dog today. Celebrating a complicated, deeply challenging, often terrible reality in a way that only a kid can, and that she’s lucky to be able to celebrate.

How about you? How do you feel? Were you there in 1976? What did you do yesterday? Let us know!

Tomorrow! A brand new Interviews By Uma drops over at HER own site and it would mean a lot if you were to join us. Just click the link below and sign up. I think you’ll like Turning Jane, the band being featured. See you tomorrow!

INTERVIEWS BY UMA

An 11-year-old little rocker's personal site for interviews with bands, musicians, artists and writers!

By Dan Szczesny

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Well friends, it’s that time again! Every so often, Uma and I place our writing fate in your hands and ask you: “What do YOU want us to write about?”

Here’s the rules… there are no rules. Be general or be specific. Ask questions or seek our opinions. Be as detailed as you wish, or be wildly unclear. Pick a musician or artist, or an album or painting, or a book or a sculpture.

Ask us, for example, about that Starbucks we’re standing in front of in the picture above, the world’s biggest. (Or maybe it isn’t, but it’s the biggest we ever set foot in.)

Nothing is off the table. (Well, you know, be appropriate because we’re family friendly!)

When we’ve done this in the past, we’ve tackled quite a few of your suggestions. If you made a suggestion and we didn’t get to it, ask us again! You never know! Last time we asked was October, 2024.

You all know us pretty well, don’t be afraid! Be curious. We’re curious too so hopefully we’ll learn something as well!

There’s a bunch of really interesting projects in the formation stage that we’re going to bring here - my recent trip to Chicago for a library conference, some cool new books coming to the library, visiting Sue (if you know, you know), an end of school year interview with Uma and her best friend, and on Monday the next installment of Interviews By Uma.

Speaking of which, we built a brand new Substack geared just for Uma’s interviews. You ought to go over there and toss her a subscription, or recommendation to your music loving friends. You can click that below.

Meantime, let’s hear it gang. What shall we write about?

INTERVIEWS BY UMA

An 11-year-old little rocker's personal site for interviews with bands, musicians, artists and writers!

By Dan Szczesny

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Finally, a baby board book made for dads!

One of the absolute treasures I managed to bring back from my American Library Association Conference was the greatest board book ever written.

(Ok, to be fair, Goodnight Moon is the greatest, but let’s just say a close second!)

Written by Cheri Love-Byrd and hilariously illustrated by Liv Wan, I Love You A Waffle Lot! debuted at the expo and I brought one home for our library.

As board books go, this one doesn’t exactly tell a story. It’s more of a page after page of dad joke alliteration telling your child how much you love them using food, as the title suggests!

Two things: first, it will make you hungry. Second, some of the ladies on staff didn’t find it as hilariously hilarious as I did. But I can’t imagine a funnier line than to tell your beloved baby, “You’re bacon me smile!” Get it? ‘Cause the baby is makin’ daddy smile but instead it’s bacon and there’s a picture of two strips of bacon sunning themselves.

Anywho, I donut know how the book will do, but orange you glad we have it on our shelves?

Stop by and check it out. But not on an empty stomach!

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Four years ago today, somebody stole our Little Free Library.

To say it was an unhappy core memory and learning experience for us is putting it mildly. But it also turned into one of the most positive community bonding events we ever experienced.

We built our own Little Library at first, a little larger than the typical ones. We signed it, added a school desk and Uma filled it with rocks and toys to give away. At the time, it never occurred to us to fasten it into the ground with concrete postings because, well, who would steal a little library?

We misjudged human awfulness I suppose.

That was also a time when we had no ring cameras or anything set up. So, one fine morning about a week after the picture above was taken, we awoke to discover it was gone. All of it. The books. The table. The library.

For some reason, the thieves dumped out Uma’s rocks. They found no value in them. They also left the sign welcoming people and saying it was a Little Free Library.

Is it too gracious of me to suggest that when they saw the Little Free Library sign, they thought it meant the library was free to take? At any rate, lesson learned. It was a devastating couple days for Uma.

But then something unexpected happened. Word got out. Family and friends began to come together to make things right. We didn’t expect or ask for any of it, but donations began to come in… books, toys. And then organizations like Jake’s Gym and Girls at Work and Stonyfield reached out. And then, incredibly, money began coming.

Soon, our little neighborhood of friends had raised enough for us to buy a proper Little Free Library from the LFL organization. We added a bench. We landscaped the area.

The mayor even reached out to us and attended our grand opening! How did all that happen!

About two months after the first library was stolen, we reopened a second one, more lovely than ever, thanks to an outpouring of kindness and generosity from our neighbors, friends and city.

We donated the toys and books we had left over to good causes.

Four years later, our Little Library thrives. We decorated it with solar lights. The garden around it has grown. Three other Little Libraries have sprung up within a block or two so now we’re a little library consortium!

Every couple weeks we’ll update from a book stock shelf we have in the garage, and Uma still put toys and rocks out there.

The library is listed on the Little Free Library database as Charter #150133, but we know it as The Ladybug House. There are awful things in this world, it’s true, and on any scale of terrible things, having a Little Free Library stolen isn’t that bad really.

Still, if nothing else, the episode illustrated what’s possible when people decide to help each other. We’re a tiny dot in a vast, endless sea of dots. You all are. But never think that a small gesture can’t make a difference like it did for my daughter.

We continue to fill and empty and refill that bright red tiny book shelf by the street because it meant something, and it means something still. Sometimes things work out.

How about you all? Have you visited a Little Free Library lately? Do you have one near you you’d like to highlight. Send us a picture at danszczesny@gmail.com and we’ll post a photo collage! Till then, keep on reading!

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Over the course of the last six days, we ran a serialized short story called “The Relic of Corpus Christi.” I hope you all enjoy it! If you missed it or came in the middle, here’s a link to Part 1 and you can read forward from there: The Relic, Part One.

Engagement for the serial was decent so we hope you all got a kick out of it. Fiction posts here have always done well.

During the course of the serial, we received quite a few comments and questions. So, to wrap things up, I thought I’d answer them here for you!

SETTING: The story of the holy man thief and the hard boiled detective who pursues him is set in Berlin, NH for a reason. Back when the story germinated in 2018, I was occasionally attending a writer’s group based in Berlin hosted by a long time writer friend so I was spending some time up there. Plus, big chunks of my book, The White Mountain, take place in Berlin. So I was part of that place at that time!

THE CHURCH: The fictional Corpus Christi is actually based on historic St. Anne Church in Berlin. Founded in 1867, the church was Berlin’s first Roman Catholic congregation. And like the church in the story, low attendance forced St. Anne to combine with several other congregations to survive.

ALTAR Vs. ALTER: It was pointed out that I spelled ALTAR as ALTER throughout the story! Yike! But thank you. Given that this is a first draft, you all are technically my editors so I appreciate any feedback like that. I wouldn’t alter our relationship at all! At least I didn’t spell serial as cereal!

THE RELIC: Yes, that’s a thing in the Roman Catholic Church. In fact, relics are divided by classes - first, second and third - according to their proximity to a saint or to Jesus himself. Think of it like this: Third Class is a item touched by a saint. Second Class is an item owned by a saint. First Class is an item linked to or part of a saint. Here’s a great story about some famous relics: Famous Relics to Saints

THE CROSS SPLINTER: The relic in the story, a sliver of the cross of Jesus, is a common relic in churches across the world. Some estimates place cross splinters in the thousands. Though in truth, most scholars will tell you that such splinters are historically and biologically highly unlikely. St. Anne in Berlin’s relic is a fragment of St. Anne’s forearm.

ST. ANNE: I wasn’t asked this, but just for fun… St. Anne is the mother of Mary, so the grandma of Jesus. While not mentioned in the canonical Gospels, Anne is all over the New Testament writings of the time. So, she has relics all over the world. The weirdest of them all is in Annakirche (St. Anne’s Church) in Düren, Germany. They allegedly possess St. Anne’s head. It’s in a basket. Really, I’m not kidding. Here’s the picture.

Thanks again for reading along, it was… fun! And don’t forget that Uma has her very own newsletter page, called Interview By Uma, where we’re going to post all her interviews with musicians and artists. Click below to subscribe:

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The Relic of Corpus Christi, P6

Deacon Peter Getsas is easy to follow. Back when I first hung my detective shingle and had no clients, I used to practice by tracking Peter around town. The thing that all the detective shows and movies get wrong is that it’s incredibly difficult to follow someone without them noticing. If you’re following a car in a city, the lights and pedestrians make it nearly impossible to coordinate. If you’re on foot in a small town where everyone knows someone, people are going to stop to say hi. There’s never enough of a crowd to blend in. In order to follow someone in those circumstances, you have to be close. You almost have to let them know you’re there, but not realize you’re there because you’re following them.

But today, in the case of Peter, it’s easy. He’s distracted, moving slowly, unsure of his destination, or perhaps out for some air to clear his mind of some troubling thought. Berlin isn’t a city with much foot traffic anyway, but it is mid-afternoon so the main street has some folks coming and going. The weather is holding, perhaps one of the final moderate days before winter clutches us in an icy grip.

Peter has lived in the same white, two story clapboard for all his life near as I can tell. He was born here, went to school here. His whole life was dedicated to Gloria and to Corpus Christie. I can’t begin to imagine what losing both those things must have done to him, or must have driven him to do.

I know he took it. I knew he took it from the moment I walked into that church. And if a judge asked me how I knew, I would have nothing to say that would make any sense.

I hadn’t spoken to Peter in years, but from the moment I looked into his eyes, I knew he was the thief.

And as he and I make our way down Berlin’s dusty main street – he on the left, me on the right about fifty feet back – I begin to realize how much time has passed between us, how little time each of us have left.

My options are limited, of course. I can confront him, based on nothing. He’s older now, has little left to lose now that the church has closed so there’s no reason why he wouldn’t just deny everything. There’s no street value to the relic. Heck the church didn’t even file a crime report with the police. Parishioners will slowly find out, some already know. But really, who cares about this anyway.

Peter is 70 years old. He’s holding on, that has to be what this is about. He turns left up Central and heads down to the flat near the river and I suddenly realize where he going. And as I watch him slowly make his way down to the cemetery, I come to realize one more thing.

I miss him.

________________________

When Gloria finally died, after a long, brutal battle in which the universe stripped her of everything, I finally began to understand that mortal sacrifice was needed in order to bathe in the harmony of the beatitudes – those eight blessings of Jesus proclaimed during the Sermon on the Mount. For a long time, I understood those rules – the meek inheriting the Earth, blessed are the peacemakers – as being way-markers for living grace. But once I had nothing, once James and then Gloria left, once it became clear that Corpus Christie was dying, well, I began to understand that grace meant surrender.

I wasn’t prepared to surrender just yet.

And I was beginning to believe that this impulsive act of taking the relic had a greater purpose than preservation or some quest of the spirit. My thoughts on this matter started becoming clearer as I walked to Gloria’s grave, and suddenly realized – much to my delight – that I was being followed.

I am not a young man, nor am I quick on my feet, a fast learner or even really terribly vested in my surroundings. I tend to get lost in my thoughts easily.

But for some reason, I know James is there. I don’t even turn or look around. I just know it. I clutch the locket in the jacket pocket and thank Jesus for beginning the process of bringing us back together. Perhaps that was the reason for my being called to steal the relic. Here was one final door being opened for me, a reward at the end of my long life of service. I was deserving, was I not? I suffered like Job, for my faith, my family, my church.

I bundle my jacket up around my neck as a North Country wind comes in off the river to remind me that fall is right around the corner. Gloria’s cemetery (our cemetery) is not attached to the church. She wanted a view of the river. She wanted those who visited her – which was only me – to be able to sit on the little rise of her grave and watch the river flow below. A hundred years ago, that river was so packed with trees that a logger could walk across on the log jams. Today, all that remains of that time gone by are the boom piers in the middle of the river, used to keep the logs flowing. That and all these graves, of course, testament of all the north country folks that lived and died in the shadow of these hills, and now all that remains is a two by three granite stone.

And somebody like me, sitting alone in a graveyard by the river.

_______________________________________

By the time I reach the cemetery, Peter is already there, sitting beside Gloria’s grave. The day has turned into that kind of New England autumn raw when the colored leaves and damp earth make it clear that there’s no stopping winter now. I’ve never visited Gloria’s grave, never even bothered to come to this cemetery, but I hang back for a bit to let Peter have some peace.

We’re alone, of course, no one would visit this cemetery unless they had a loved one buried here; open and plain as it is, damp from the nearby river and misty weather. Only the view of the river stands out.

Peter isn’t going anywhere. It’s cold. I get impatient and finally come into view, walk over to the small bench and sit down next to the man who I once called father. The sun begins to touch the horizon behind us casting a yellow glow over Gloria’s marker, which reads “Wife and Mother.”

“Why’d she put ‘mother’ there,” I ask.

“She thought of herself that way,” Peter says. Then sighs and says, “To you, James.”

“Where is it?” I ask.

He doesn’t move, doesn’t even look at me.

I try again. “Okay then, why did you take it? What was the point?”

“It was the last thing that was mine, the last thing in my life I could see to the end.”

“The church, you mean,” I ask. “Because it was closing?”

Peter shrugs. “The church. Her. You. All of it.”

The sun is nearly down now and the cemetery is gray and sad.

“Where is it?” I ask again.

He reaches into his pocket and pulls out a locket, the tarnished gold glints slightly against the sun’s final rays. He sighs, his eyes welling up, and drops it into my hand.

“What now,” he asks. “Will you arrest me.”

I’m cold, my hands are starting to grow numb and our breath is coming up over our faces now in big clouds. I stand up, walk over to Gloria’s grave and with the heel of my boots kick up about three or four inches of hardening dirt. I drop the locket into the hole, cover it back up and head back the way I came. Over my shoulder I say, “Go home Peter.”

______________________________________

The morning after our encounter in the graveyard, I’m watching James talk to Father Porter. We’re in the rectory dressing room.

“Where did you find it, who took it,” Father Porter is asking.

“Listen, father, we managed to figure this out without police, with barely any notice from your congregation, let’s not make it worse,” James says. “The person who took it is sorry, it’s back, neither the church or you need any more fuss.”

I have no clue whether James just pinched a splinter from a tree or a table. He didn’t tell me. The new relic is in a tiny baggie. Father Porter is not holding the relic of Corpus Christi, but a fake.

“Thank you, James.” Father Porter places a hand on James’ shoulder and pockets the baggie. Before he walks off, he looks at me. “Let’s all just consider this settled.”

James turns to leave and I watch him go. But before he’s out of earshot, I say, “James, maybe we could have dinner sometime?”

“Don’t press your luck, Pete,” he says. But he lifts a hand and waves and I watch him turn the corner and out of sight.

I stand there alone for a few minutes, my hand tightly clutching the locket in my pocket, before taking a deep breath and heading off to close my church.

And so concludes our six part presentation of my new story, The Relic of Corpus Christi. I hope you all enjoyed the story. Let me know if this type of serializing method works for you. And please share and tell us what you think of the story!

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The Relic of Corpus Christi, Part 5

There is no black market, no consortium of billionaires pulling the Vatican strings who collect relics, like some Illuminati club for saint bones and silver coins. Who would believe me anyway? And further, who would care?

With shaking hands, I pry open Gloria’s locket. She was wearing it when she died. Since I first met her, I knew the locket to hold a tiny black and white picture of her parents. The day after she died, I tossed that picture in the garbage, and replaced it with a small lock of her hair.

I haven’t opened the locket again since that day. I try not to breath, lest the tiny lock of hair scatter to the four winds. I’m unable to resist touching it, touching her, and my mind is instantly filled with the sensation – the feel and touch – of her hair. Once golden, then white, then as the cancer shredded her life and dignity, the hair disappeared leaving only short brittle fuzz. I pull my finger away, the pain too much to contemplate and there on the end of my finger is a miniscule sliver of hair.

My Gloria, my life, reduced to this.

The relic rests inside a tiny baggy, which I gentle fold in two and press it into the locket amid Gloria’s hair. With some effort I close the locket and hold it tight inside my fist for a few moments.

What’s my end game here? Will this be my legacy? I laugh out loud a bit at the thought of legacy. The only other human on the planet that I love is the person who could end up arresting me. I doubted James cared much about my legacy anymore. If he ever did.

I tuck the locket into my front vest pocket, take a deep breath and leave my home. It was time to face the universe with what I’d done.

Tomorrow, Part 6 and the conclusion of The Relic of Corpus Christi. Join us and tell us what you think!

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The Relic of Corpus Christi, Part 4

I’m sipping whiskey at my favorite dive across the river, in the section of town officially called West Berlin. But most townies just refer to this neighborhood as The Hill. The bar I’m in has no name, but I call it home.

I’m drinking to long lost parents, and to working for nearly pro-bono to track down a sliver of wood the size of an ant. This – were I spiritual man – would be that moment in my life where I would take inventory and turn the corner, stop drinking in bars with no name and discover a higher purpose. But instead, it’s noon and I’m on my fifth shot.

I’m not a heavy drinker, or at least I haven’t been for a long time. But getting that phone call yesterday afternoon did something to my brain, or maybe my heart. Who knows, maybe even my soul.

I’m no monster, no ungrateful son. Even if I wasn’t technically Pete and Gloria’s son, I know what they did for me. But I also know what I did to them. So I just kept away. And trust me, in a town the size of Berlin it’s not easy keeping away.

I toss a few bucks on the bar and head out into the fall chill. There’s nowhere in Berlin where you can’t walk. Winter will be here soon, raw and angry. I pull a knit cap down over my ears to cover my mostly bald head; bald at 35, there’s a kick in the gut. Maybe it’s all the booze.

But in the end if you don’t face up to your failings, life will just force you to. That’s how it works, right, karma. Pete would say redemption. But even as word slowly leaks out that a relic is missing, as the talking heads and gossips start spreading around rumors, I have a pretty good idea what’s going on here.

I have nearly no redeemable qualities in this life – no family, no friends, no future. But I am good at one thing. I know when somebody is lying.

The only thing I need to do now is figure out why.

Tomorrow, Part 5 of The Relic of Corpus Christi. Join us and tell us what you think!

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