Soapbox

This Day in History

Quick time check- what happened 27 years ago today?
John Lennon was shot at the Dakota in New York City.

27 years? Now I feel really old. I remember that night very well. I was upstairs in our house on Shannon Ave- it was winter break my senior year in college. My Dad came in and told us that he’d just heard on the TV that John Lennon had been shot. Becky didn’t believe him- I mean, who would shoot John Lennon, for goodness’ sake? And why? What possible reason could there be for wanting to silence him?

Fame, as it turned out: the desire to be someone that people will notice. Kill a famous person, BE a famous person. And in America, everybody wants to be famous, don’t they? It’s the American dream.

Becky, Julia (my former roommate, who was staying with us that break) and I hurried downstairs and turned on the TV. After the 11:00 news they ran a hastily put together special with all the details that were then known plus retrospective of Lennon’s life and career… and we watched, feeling numb.
In a desire- a need to observe some sort of ritual to mark this passing, Becky and I made black arm bands and covered the mirror in our room. I still have a photo of the two of us, arms around each other, in our nightgowns and arm bands, taken that night.

It seemed at the time that such an event should change something, somehow- but time has just waltzed on. A few people wrote songs about him, and they built him a cool little park in New York City. Yoko Ono is building a tower of light in Iceland, the "Imagine" tower, to be a symbol for peace, which is pretty artsy, and very nice. but…. Of course now I am wise enough to know that the loss of a life, no matter how bright the light, doesn’t really change much at all. The world keeps going, and often doesn’t even seem to notice. When you’re young, you want to believe that some people are too big to be just snuffed out by some random, weird fate. Lennon was one of them.

I recall saying to a friend in high school that John Lennon would be the coolest old man- and what an amazing grandfather to have! And now I can’t help reflecting that Lennon would also be a strong and effective voice against this stupid war at a time when we need all the voices we can get. He would not have ben put off by the "You’re either with us or you’re with the terrorists" crap. He heard all that before and shrugged it off as the nattering of fools. From what I have read, Lennon battled a host of personal demons on the road to discovering his place of peace and certainty, and would not allow anyone to shake his belief in himself and his path, once he found it. The world needs more people like that.

On the ubiquitous Christmas music tape at work there is a cover of Lennon’s "Happy Christmas (War is Over)" but whomever sings it leaves out the War is over" part! I find this deeply offensive for so many reasons. First, as a songwriter, I object to people who seem incapable of singing a song the way it was written! What in the world would posess you to think that you know better than John Lennon how this song should sound?
And what gives you the right to decide what his song should say? If you don’t like the simple, gentle and non-political anti-war message of "Happy Christmas" then fine- don’t record it! Write your own damn song! Peace activism was such a huge part of John Lennon’s life work that to rob his song of that message is like robbing his grave. Every time that song plays, I quietly sing the words that I know should be there, as my own little protest.

So today I shall try to imagine a world where people can live in peace, and each life matters and each child cherished… and no one values fame so much that they are willing to silence the voice of a generation to attain it. And where no one grants them that fame by remembering their name.

John Ono Lennon
October 8th, 1940
December 8th, 1980

War is over, if you want it
War is over now.