PLAYBOY: Are you concerned, as you approach 30, that you may begin to “go square,” lose some of your openness to experience, become leery of change and new experiment?
DYLAN: No. But if it happens, then it happens. What can I say? There doesn’t seem to be any tomorrow. Every time I wake up, no matter in what position, it’s always been today. To look ahead and start worrying about trivial little things I can’t really say has any more importance than looking back and remembering trivial little things. I’m not going to become any poetry instructor at any girls’ school; I know that for sure. But that’s about all I know for sure. I’ll just keep doing these different things, I guess.
PLAYBOY: Such as?
DYLAN: Waking up in different positions.
PLAYBOY: Well, what do you believe in?
DYLAN: I already told you.
PLAYBOY: All right. Many of your folksinging colleagues remain actively involved in the fight for civil rights, free speech and withdrawal from Vietnam. Do you think they’re wrong?
DYLAN: I don’t think they’re wrong, if that’s what they see themselves doing. But don’t think that what you’ve got out there is a bunch of little Buddhas all parading up and down. People that use God as a weapon should be amputated upon.
PLAYBOY: […] How do you feel about these far-out hair styles?
DYLAN: The thing that most people don’t realize is that it’s warmer to have long hair. Everybody wants to be warm. People with short hair freeze easily. Then they try to hide their coldness, and they get jealous of everybody that’s warm. Then they become either barbers or Congressmen. A lot of prison wardens have short hair. Have you ever noticed that Abraham Lincoln’s hair was much longer than John Wilkes Booth’s?
PLAYBOY: Do you think Lincoln wore his hair long to keep his head warm?
DYLAN: Actually, I think it was for medical reasons, which are none of my business. But I guess if you figure it out, you realize that all of one’s hair surrounds and lays on the brain inside your head. Mathematically speaking, the more of it you can get out of your head, the better. People who want free minds sometimes overlook the fact that you have to have an uncluttered brain. Obviously, if you get your hair on the outside of your head, your brain will be a little more freer. But all this talk about long hair is just a trick. It’s been thought up by men and women who look like cigars - the anti-happiness committee. They’re all freeloaders and cops. You can tell who they are: They’re always carrying calendars, guns or scissors. They’re all trying to get into your quicksand. They think you’ve got something. I don’t know why Abe Lincoln had long hair.
PLAYBOY: Mistake or not, what made you decide to go the rock-‘n’-roll route?
DYLAN: Carelessness. I lost my one true love. I started drinking. The first thing I know, I’m in a card game. Then I’m in a crap game. I wake up in a pool hall. Then this big Mexican lady drags me off the table, takes me to Philadelphia. She leaves me alone in her house, and it burns down. I wind up in Phoenix. I get a job as a Chinaman. I start working in a dime store, and move in with a 13-year-old girl. Then this big Mexican lady from Philadelphia comes in and burns the house down. I go down to Dallas. I get a job as a “before” in a Charles Atlas “before and after” ad. I move in with a delivery boy who can cook fantastic chili and hot dogs. Then this 13-year-old girl from Phoenix comes and burns the house down. The delivery boy - he ain’t so mild: He gives her the knife, and the next thing I know I’m in Omaha. It’s so cold there, by this time I’m robbing my own bicycles and frying my own fish. I stumble onto some luck and get a job as a carburetor out at the hot-rod races every Thursday night. I move in with a high school teacher who also does a little plumbing on the side, who ain’t much to look at, but who’s built a special kind of refrigerator that can turn newspaper into lettuce. Everything’s going good until that delivery boy shows up and tries to knife me. Needless to say, he burned the house down, and I hit the road. The first guy that picked me up asked me if I wanted to be a star. What could I say?
PLAYBOY: And that’s how you became a rock-‘n’-roll singer?
DYLAN: No, that’s how I got tuberculosis.
You have to change!! You hear me!! Today!! Right now!! You have to change your life or you’re going to kill someone or someone is going to kill you!! Is that what you want?? Is it??
This is it!! There’s no second chance. There’s no “do over!!” You have to change now!!
Say you’re sorry. Now do something with your life!!
It’s about that time again. Time to be honest with ourselves. When we live with someone who’s immortal, omnipresent, and ambidextrous, its hard to really know if you are alone when you are with your special person.
Admit it. You’ve always had some questions for Mr. Salvatore. How’d you know I love to be picked up? Where do you get all of those tvs? Do you really just have a cartilage skeleton that enables you to bend so awesomely?
So now’s the time. Ever wanted to ask God a question? This is kind of like that. I’ll start. Nick, what’s the best way to gut a fish?
