the grassy knoll

 

Sunday, November 24, 1963

It was two days after the assassination of U.S. President John F. Kennedy.  We went to church and then came home.  My mother was in the kitchen preparing lunch.

In the living room the television set was on.  My dad was sitting on an antique rocking chair.  I was on the floor doing something -- playing with dolls, or marbles, or coloring with crayons in a coloring book.

We were waiting, because we were going to get to see, on TV, Lee Harvey Oswald, the man who had allegedly shot and killed President Kennedy two days  before.

The desire to see Oswald came from shocked curiosity and horror, I guess.  As a child, if I'd been alone I would not have looked for this info on TV, but since my father was going to watch it, I stayed in the room and waited with him.  

('We're going to -- see -- Oswald.')

And then on the television screen, in black-and-white, a bunch of men wearing hats... and my dad stood up very suddenly and called out toward the kitchen in shock and disbelief, "My God, they shot him!"

______________________________

On You Tube, type in

Bob Dylan - Don't Think Twice, It's All Right (Official Audio)

uploader / channel:  Bob Dylan

And Play.

♪ ♫ ♫ ♪

Well, it ain't no use to sit and wonder why, babe

It don't matter, anyhow

An' it ain't no use to sit and wonder why, babe

If you don't know by now

When your rooster crows at the break of dawn

Look out your window and -- I'll be gone

You're the reason I'm a-trav'lin' on

But don't think twice, it's all right

It ain't no use in turnin' on your light, babe

That light I -- never knowed

An' it ain't no use in turnin' on your light, babe

I'm on the dark side of the road

Still I wish there was somethin' you would do or say

To try and make me change my mind and stay

We never did too much talkin' anyway

So don't think twice, it's all right

It ain't no use in callin' out my name, gal

Like you never did before

It ain't no use in callin' out my name, gal

I can't hear you anymore

I'm a-thinkin' and a-wond'rin' all the way down the road

I once loved a woman, a child I'm told

I give her my heart, but she wanted my soul

But don't think twice, it's all right

I'm walkin' down that long, lonesome road, babe

Where I'm bound, I can't tell

But goodbye's too good a word, gal

So I'll just say fare thee well

I ain't sayin' you treated me unkind

You could have done better but -- I don't mind

You just kinda wasted my -- precious time

But don't think twice, it's all right

______________________________

{"Don't Think Twice, It's All Right" -- a song written by Bob Dylan in 1962, recorded on November 14th of that year, and released on the 1963 album The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan and as the b-side of the "Blowin' in the Wind" single.)

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Dealey Plaza

 

November 22, 1963 was a Friday.  I was five years old, and not in kindergarten until the next fall.

So I was outside playing and went indoors for some reason.  As you came in the front door of our house in Akron, Ohio, straight ahead were stairs leading up to the second floor.  To the left was a dining room and a kitchen, separated by a fascinating (to me) swinging door.  

To the right was the living room.  My parents were standing in the living room, sort of crying softly.  The television set was on.

Grown-ups crying was strange and unusual, to me.

People watching TV in the middle of the day was strange and unusual.

And people watching TV while standing up was weird, too.

        I stood silent and motionless in the doorway.  I didn't have any words to describe this scenario.  I couldn't read and write yet, though I could write my name and say the letters of the alphabet.  However, these skills and memorizations did not cover this situation.

I guess I asked what was wrong and someone answered, "President Kennedy has been killed."

---------------------------------

I only knew President Kennedy's name, at that time, because my mother had been reading the fairy tales aloud to me, and since there was always a King or Queen in those stories, I asked her one day, "Who is the King of our country?"

And she looked kind of surprised and said, "Well, we don't have a king.  We are a democracy, we have a president.  The people vote for him." 

        That sounded good to me.

"So, who is our president?"

"Kennedy."

________________________________

On You Tube type in

Jumpin' Jack Flash

uploader / channel:  The Rolling Stones

        and Play.

♫ ♫ ♪

One, two!

I was born -- in a crossfire hurricane

And I howled at the morning drivin' rain

But it's all -- right -- now, in fact it's a gas

But it's all right, I'm jumpin' jack flash

It's a gas, gas, gas...

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slave to fate, chance, kings, and desperate men

 

Death, be not proud, though some have called thee

Mighty and dreadful, for thou art not so;

For those whom thou think'st thou does overthrow

Die not, poor Death, nor yet canst thou kill me.

From rest and sleep, which but thy pictures be,

Much pleasure; then from thee much more must flow,

And soonest our best men with thee do go, 

Rest of their bones, and soul's delivery.

Thou art slave to fate, chance, kings, and desperate men,

And dost with poison, war, and sickness dwell,

And poppy or charms can make us sleep as well

And better than thy stroke; why swell'st thou then?

One short sleep past, we wake eternally

And death shall be no more; Death, thou shalt die.

John Donne

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death be not proud

 

More information out on the situation in Virginia where a six-year-old boy brought a gun to school and shot his teacher:

The family of the child has now put out a statement --

     1.  They are saying the gun was secured

     2.  They say the child has "an acute disability"

     3.  There was a policy for the child where one or the other of his parents had to be with him in the classroom every day

     4.  The parents stopped showing up to school the week of the shooting.

        WHAT?????????????!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

||    If the gun was "secured," the kid could not have got it.  He got it and brought it to school, so it must not have been "secured."  Lying??!!

||    Claiming "acute disability" -- classic bid for pity, after their spawn shoots up the joint - ??!!

||    The parents stopped attending class with their kid because............................................. they didn't wanna-get-shot??!!

None of this makes sense, to me.

        They have a lawyer now -- they're going to keep on saying, "The gun was secured" in a typical "that's-our-story-and-we're-sticking-to-it" strategy.

----------------------------------------------

        I did some substitute-teaching in the high school in 2006 -- at that time I thought it was fun and interesting.

Now, if I had a teaching degree and I was offered a teaching job anyplace, for one year, to be paid a trillion dollars, I would say No.

        (And I could use a trillion dollars.)

But this is just ridiculous.

        Instead of "cuckoo-for-Cocoa-Puffs" our society has gone "gaga-for-guns."

One of the articles about the incident quoted someone who said a six-year-old could not know the meaning of death.

        That's not true.  I was just barely five when President Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, and I knew what death meant.  I don't know how I knew that, or where I learned it.  

        But I knew what it meant.  I knew if the president was dead, he was not coming back, and he could not be president anymore, and the Vice President would have to step into that job.

        The president was dead and had gone to Heaven.

Where do these article-people come up with this shit?

"A six-year-old doesn't know what death is."

Blah-blah-blah.

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you've got a prayer in Memphis

 

Memphis Tennessee Beale Street

        I was listening to this song and it mentions Beale Street.  For a long time, if I heard "Beale Street" I always thought it was in New Orleans, but that's wrong, it's in Memphis, Tennessee.

♪♫ ♫

Put on my blue suede shoes 

And I boarded the plane

Touched down in the land of the Delta Blues

In the middle of the pouring rain

W.C. Handy, won't you look down over me?

Yeah, I got a first class ticket

But I'm as blue as a boy can be

Then I'm walking in Memphis

Was walking with my feet ten feet off of Beale

Walking in Memphis

But do I really feel the way I feel?

Saw the ghost of Elvis

On Union Avenue

Followed him up to the gates of Graceland

Then I watched him walk right through...

[On You Tube, type in

Marc Cohn - Walking in Memphis (Official Music Video)

uploader / channel:  RHINO

... and Play]

♫ ♪ ♪    When I was walking in Memphis

I was walking with my feet ten feet off of Beale

Walking in Memphis

But do I really feel the way I feel?

They've got catfish on the table

They've got gospel in the air

And Reverend Green be glad to see you

When you haven't got a prayer

But, boy, you've got a prayer in Memphis

Now Muriel plays piano

Every Friday at the Hollywood

And they brought me down to see her

And they asked me if I would

Do a little number

And I sang with all my might

She said

"Tell me are you a Christian, child?"

And I said "Ma'am, I am tonight"

Walking in Memphis

(Walking in Memphis)

Was walking with my feet ten feet off of Beale

Walking in Memphis

(Walking in Memphis)

But do I really feel the way I feel?

Walking in Memphis

(Walking in Memphis)

I was walking with my feet ten feet off of Beale

Walking in Memphis

(Walking in Memphis)

But do I really feel the way I feel?

Put on my blue suede shoes

And I boarded the plane

Touched down in the land of the Delta Blues

In the middle of the pouring rain

Touched down in the land of the Delta Blues

In the middle of the pouring rain

________________________________

{"Walking In Memphis" -- written and recorded by Marc Cohn}

-30-

...but I wouldn't stop there

 

----------------------------- [excerpts from Martin Luther King Jr. speech, delivered April 3, 1968, at Mason Temple in Memphis, Tennessee]

Something is happening in Memphis; something is happening in our world.  And you know, if I were standing at the beginning of time, with the possibility of taking a kind of general and panoramic view of the whole of human history up to now, and the Almighty said to me, "Martin Luther King, which age would you like to live in?" 

I would take my mental flight by Egypt and I would watch God's children in their magnificent trek from the dark dungeons of Egypt through, or rather across the Red Sea, through the wilderness on toward the promised land.  And in spite of its magnificence, I wouldn't stop there.

I would move on by Greece and take my  mind to Mount Olympus.  And I would see Plato, Aristotle, Socrates, Euripides and Aristophanes assembled around the Parthenon.  And I would watch them around the Parthenon as they discussed the great and eternal issues of reality.  But I wouldn't stop there.

I would go on, even to the great heyday of the Roman Empire.  And I would see developments around there, through various emperors and leaders.  But I wouldn't stop there.

I would even come up to the day of the Renaissance, and get a quick picture of all that the Renaissance did for the cultural and aesthetic life of man.  But I wouldn't stop there.

I would even go by the way that the man for whom I am named had his habitat.  And I would watch Martin Luther as he tacked his ninety-five theses on the door at the church of Wittenberg.  But I wouldn't stop there.

I would come on up even to 1863, and watch a vacillating President by the name of Abraham Lincoln finally come to the conclusion that he had to sign the Emancipation Proclamation.  But I wouldn't stop there.

I would even come up to the early thirties, and see a man grappling with the problems of the bankruptcy of his nation.  And come with an eloquent cry that we have nothing to fear but "fear itself."  But I wouldn't stop there.

Strangely enough, I would turn to the Almighty, and say, "If you allow me to live just a few years in the second half of the 20th century, I will be happy."

...And also in the human rights revolution, if something isn't done, and done in a hurry, to bring the colored peoples of the world out of their long years of poverty, their long years of hurt and neglect, the whole world is doomed.  Now, I'm just happy that God has allowed me to live in this period to see what is unfolding.  And I'm happy that He's allowed me to be in Memphis.

...Now, what does all of this mean in this great period of history?  It means that we've got to stay together.  We've got to stay together and maintain unity.  You know, whenever Pharaoh wanted to prolong the period of slavery in Egypt, he had a favorite, favorite formula for doing it.  What was that?  

        He kept the slaves fighting among themselves.  But whenever the slaves get together, something happens in Pharaoh's court, and he cannot hold the slaves in slavery.  When the slaves get together, that's the beginning of getting out of slavery.  Now let us maintain unity.

...Now we're going to march again, and we've got to march again, in order to put the issue where it is supposed to be -- and force everybody to see that there are thirteen hundred of God's children here suffering, sometimes going hungry, going through dark and dreary nights wondering how this thing is going to come out.  

That's the issue.  And we've got to say to the nation:  We know how it's coming out.  For when people get caught up with that which is right and they are willing to sacrifice for it, there is no stopping point short of victory.

We aren't going to let any mace stop us.  We are masters in our nonviolent movement in disarming police forces; they don't know what to do.  I've seen them so often.  I remember in Birmingham, Alabama, when we were in that majestic struggle there, we would move out of the 16th Street Baptist Church day after day; by the hundreds we would move out.  

        And Bull Connor would tell them to send the dogs forth, and they did come; but we just went before the dogs singing, "Ain't gonna let nobody turn me around."

Bull Connor next would say, "Turn the fire hoses on."  And as I said to you the other night, Bull Connor didn't know history.  He knew a kind of physics that somehow didn't relate to the transphysics that we knew about.  

And that was the fact that there was a certain kind of fire that no water could put out.  And we went before the fire hoses; we had known water.  

If we were Baptist or some other denominations, we had been immersed.  

If we were Methodist, and some others, we had been sprinkled, but we knew water.  

That couldn't stop us.

And we just went on before the dogs and we would look at them; and we'd go on before the water hoses and we would look at it, and we'd just go on singing "Over my head I see freedom in the air."  And then we would be thrown in the paddy wagons, and sometimes we were stacked in there like sardines in a can.  And they would throw us in, and old Bull would say, "Take 'em off," and they did; and we would just go in the paddy wagon singing, "We Shall Overcome."  

And every now and then we'd get in jail, and we'd see the jailers looking through the windows being moved by our prayers, and being moved by our words and our songs.  And there was a power there which Bull Connor couldn't adjust to; and so we ended up transforming Bull into a steer, and we won our struggle in Birmingham.  Now we've got to go on in Memphis just like that.  I call upon you to be with us when we go out Monday.

...I left Atlanta this morning, and as we got started on the plane, there were six of us.  The pilot said over the public address system, "We are sorry for the delay, but we have Dr. Martin Luther King on the plane.  And to be sure that all of the bags were checked, and to be sure that nothing would be wrong with anything on the plane, we had to check out everything carefully.  And we've had the plane protected and guarded all night."

And then I got into Memphis.  And some began to say the threats, or talk about the threats that were out.  What would happen to me from some of our sick white brothers?

Well, I don't know what will happen now.  We've got some difficult days ahead.  But it really doesn't matter with me now, because I've been to the mountaintop.

And I don't mind.

Like anybody, I would like to live a long life.  Longevity has its place.  But I'm not concerned about that now.  I just want to do God's will.  And He's allowed me to go up to the mountain.  And I've looked over.  And I've seen the Promised Land.  I may not get there with you.  But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the promised land!

And so I'm happy, tonight.

I'm not worried about anything.

I'm not fearing any man!

Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord!

_____________________________

Martin Luther King, Jr.

(January 15, 1929 - April 4, 1968)

-30-

a-well a-bless my soul, what's a-wrong with me?

 

The news yesterday reported that Lisa Marie Presley died, at the age of 54.

She was married four times.

She recorded three albums --

To Whom It May Concern  (2003)

Now What  (2005)

Storm & Grace  (2012) - produced by T Bone Burnett (who played guitar in Bob Dylan's band during the 1970s).

        On Amazon, her albums have the label, "Currently unavailable."

        I want to look on You Tube, see if some of her songs and / or albums are on there....

I remember reading an article about Lisa Marie, maybe back in the '90s -- the thing that stayed with me was her description of moving her children from one hotel room to another, trying to dodge photographers or some other type of publicity-seekers.  She said something like -- This is what I sometimes have to do -- we'll get it done.

Sort of a low-key determination.

Decades before that, I remember a photograph of Elvis and Priscilla Presley in the local paper.  I was fascinated and a little intimidated by Priscilla's hair -- it was so dark, and so high.

-30-