JOHN LENNON AND ME

Sunday, March 29 2009

So there I was, in my dream last night hanging around with John Lennon. It was vaguely now, as in the present - well in the 21st century anyway. We were in a city which was essentially London, but could have just as easily been New York. I'll say it was London because everything felt small, cramped and cobblestoney (not that London has that many cobblestones, but that was the vibe). Also the atmosphere felt English - old, grey and slightly damp. I was definitely friends with John Winston, and he was telling me that he really wanted to go to a small, kind of exclusive party and Yoko wasn't going...so could I come and hang out with him? I think he was afraid of being bored there.
Now, the idea was in the back of my mind that I was being (or being perceived as - even worse) some kind of klingon starfucker. I was definitely worried about this, as I always felt ashamed about this type of person back in New York in my salad days, and it must have been visible because John (John Lennon, by the way) was assuring me that he was hanging with me because he genuinely admired my work (music? stories? this blog?) and wouldn't hang out with me for no reason. Being an insecure person at heart, I didn't really believe him, but basking in the glow of his Lennonness how could I argue - or worse, show my true colors? After all it was kind of a sweet deal just chilling with him, walking around the London(ish) streets - where oddly we weren't being accosted by people saying things like, "John Lennon? But you're dead mate" or "That geezer looks just like John Lennon!"
In the warp time of my dream, we were suddenly vaulting through the soggy side streets in Johnny's rather dingy (it must be said) sort of Mini Cooper/Opel hybrid - it was definitely a sports car of a certain vintage, but by no means had it been maintained. In fact, there were some unsettling (and all too earthly) signs of mere mortal-ness in his ride: candy wrappers, an old sweater, dust. It was disappointing I can tell you; to be in John Lennon's car and have it look like my old '68 Barracuda from High School. But what the hell, I was riding shotgun with the guy who wrote Strawberry Fields Forever, so I wasn't going to complain. In my mind I kept thinking 'Nobody will believe me'.
Suddenly the route we were taking seemed very familiar, and I realised we were heading toward Gatwick airport - a place I have only ever been to once or twice. But it was incredibly familiar, as an oft-taken short cut might be. JW informed me that we were indeed heading to Gatwick, and that this was the route the Beatles always used back in the day. I told him (calm as can be) that I knew this, since George Harrison had taken me this same way. What?! And the best part is that I wasn't bullshitting, I knew I had been there before, and with George.
So we snaked our way through the back alleys of this this dreamscape (Lennon was kind of a lousy driver, but I didn't say anything) and soon came to a more open country. London is like that: city, tall buildings, grey row houses, dirty chimneys, dire council estates...blam! pastures and cows. Suddenly it was as if the bucolic English countryside became confused with suburban New Jersey, and we came to a stop under a large tree in a makeshift parking lot that could have been a set from another dream called Sean Dinsmore-The Princeton years. But it was London Gatwick bizarro airport and we were parking, and as I got out it occurred to me that there should be helpers and lackeys jumping out from behind the hedgerow to get the bags of John Lennon and his obvious good friend.
No sooner had I thought it, then a tottering old stable hand came and asked if we had any bags - to which Mr. Lennon replied "I always travel light man" and I realised he didn't even have a bag, nor did I.
The airport, which resembled a sort of dilapidated hangar was buzzing with activity, and everyone inside looked impossibly cool and expensively hip. He wasn't actually in the dream, but you would imagine that Nellee Hooper was there in some cool summer whites chatting playfully with a famous yoga master from Eselin. In fact I did recognise a few old faces from the New York downtown scene of twenty years ago - celebutantes, hairdressers, and possibly a well-known fireman from the party circuit. They all seemed to nod in my direction (was it because I was with Mr. Beatle?) For a dead guy (and one of the most famous people in the world) he wasn't attracting much attention, I must say. But then again this was a pretty cool crowd. A famous crowd. I don't mean Paris Hilton famous, or even Madonna (well maybe Madonna, depends on which version) but these peeps were all insider famous...more famous than famous. Famous to the famous people famous. And so John Lennon and I just sat down by the window in the dingy, cramped room, ordered tea (I was quietly pleased we both took it with milk, no sugar) and waited for the flight to take off.
I must have been having some misgivings about why I was there at all (it was a dream after all) and he was reassuring me about my own provenance, and was very reassuring - but I wasn't sure. I never liked these people much anyway, back in my clubspotting liquid youth. I always thought they were silly. Celebrity firemen and supermodel dating hairdressers, when does it end? But that's life - and even stranger than life when it's in a dream.
I got lost in my musings and noticed that my new (I think) friend Johnny Lennon had seated himself across the room in front of some sort of famous looking life coach types (I guess, what do I know from life coaches?) and he was intently focused on a small dark man in a white robe. The Maharishi, i wondered? Now that would be cool. A second dead cultural icon and mythological figure of my youth in one dream! But then I noticed that this guy was sort of aboriginal looking, with small yellow lines painted on his cheeks, this talismanic tribesman from Tenerife. JWL started pinching this fellow's nose and rubbing his cheeks, much to the delight of A) the jolly little fellow, and B) everyone else in the room (save me, who didn't understand, and was also suffering from a confusing pang of jealousy). Up to that point I had more or less had Johnny's undivided attention.
At this point the wee man said something in Arabic (that sounded more like cartoon gibberish, but I knew it was Arabic) and Lennon and the Gang seemed to understand and they all answered back in kind, laughing and smiling knowingly. Then I knew that I was amongst a cultish clan, and the melancholy emotion of feeling left out crept in. I had no idea why I was there, what they were into, or where we were going. I only knew that somehow I was pals with John Lennon and that he had miraculously validated me. The rest was a crap shoot. As I looked around the room at the twenty or so sojourners I saw smiling faces, knowing eyes. I saw a gay Haitian coke dealer-turned party promoter who I know in my heart never liked me. I saw a balding patrician party boy-turned photographer who always wore blue blazers and took pics of celebrities...the worst kind of sycophant. Why were these people here? Why was John Lennon hanging out with them? What was I doing there? And most importantly, bizarrely, why weren't they making a bigger deal out of one half of Lennon/McCartney (the dead half at that) being in the same room with them?
I suddenly noticed my old next door neighbor from my loft on Ludlow Street, who looked exactly the same (and I might add is exactly the kind of person I would expect to be in such a New York constellation). I came over and sat down at his table and we started exclaiming about how weird it was to be bumping into each other here (in my dream). Frankly I was relieved to actually know someone else (besides John Lennon) at the party, and started to make the animated small talk of the uneasy: a bit too loud, slightly over the top. Just then John came over and was standing next to us, and I was waiting for the glow of celebrity to envelop my old neighbor, but he was looking down at his phone and madly typing or tweeting...I said, nonchalant as you like, "Hey, this is my friend John" but he kept twittering away, finally sending his missive and then looking up answered automatically (he hadn't really seen him yet: the hook nose, the Asian eyes, the glasses) "Hey Jo-h-n...". With which he got up from the table, stepped back a few paces as if he'd seen a ghost (he had actually) and turned away hiding his head under his arms on the counter of the bar/ticket counter. He turned around just as quickly and said "Oh-my-God...John Lennon! Haha, 'meet my friend John'...wow, oh my God!"
Finally!
And then I woke up.