In the kitchen, to
the hissing sound of the burning kettle, Dylan’s “She’s Your Lover Now” was
playing again and again. We were discussing the Bootleg Series and laughing about it: the song, possibly his best,
was brilliantly misogynistic.
But that was weeks
later.
Before that, I was
lying on the floor playing ice-hockey with an adorable 9-year-old girl. His
daughter. She hated losing and I wasn’t especially keen on winning. Rather, I
was keen on The Zombies’ LP from 1968 playing in the background. Out of all the
albums we were listening to in those days, Odessey
& Oracle was her clear favourite (‘Dylan is too croaky’, she once told
me; I think she only had time for “Ballad Of A Thin Man”, and that’s only
because of the piano). This time, though, she was all in the game while I could
not stop caring for cell 44 and those unfortunate casualties of the First World
War.
I was lost in that
album, irretrievably. And as for the game, she was winning and I was losing. Also,
I enjoyed watching her smile triumphantly and give a little whoop each time the
puck hit the back of my goal. Until at some point, score 23:7 in her favour,
she gave me a particularly black look and screamed: “But you are not trying,
you are losing to me on purpose!”
So next time I tried.
I tried hard. And… lost again. She whooped. “Time Of The Season” was seducing
me with its melody and its heavy breathing.
