Welcome. Today is Friday, September 7th, and while it began like any other ordinary day for me, it is also the day that I’ve decided to dip a tentative toe into the blogging pool. Since we might be meeting for the first time, I figure I should use this opportunity to introduce myself and explain who I am and why I’m here. You might be wondering about the title of my first post, and I’ll get back to that shortly, but yes, it is the title of a Bob Dylan song—one that he wrote in 1971, and I think it’s fair to say that by that point, he’d already given the universe an impressive constellation of masterfully written songs.

While writing has more or less always felt deeply ingrained within me, sharing my thoughts with an audience has not always been a natural extension, though I’ve had some practice over the past several years in getting some of my poems published in both print and online journals. That said, poetry has a limited milieu in the 21st century, and if you’re reading it and seeking it out, then you’re probably also writing poetry yourself and will therefore likely be more sensitive to the writer. I suspect the blogging landscape may feel more like open season. So you, the reader, might not always agree with what I’m sharing, but to that I say, go start your own blog. Nah, just kidding, send me a comment, let’s chat but keep in mind, life is hectic and unpredictable for all of us, and I’m not writing an advice column.

Speaking of hectic, now feels like the right time to fill you in on what I’m doing when I’m not writing, which is probably the other 22 hours of every day of my life. I’m a mom of three. My kids are ages 18, 15 and 12 years. I also have two dogs and a cat, plus a husband who’s paying the bills and keeping the lights on by working six to seven days a week at our small business. That’s the basic framework. I might add, a bustling household does not often foster a focused and productive writing schedule, but the kids are back in school, not to mention that I’m now the proud parent of a college student. My oldest has been at college for 16 days, but who’s counting, right? It’s a big transition for the family, but based on our recent phone call, he’s doing well—enjoying his classes and partaking in a healthy dose of social activities, though it’s still not clear if the laundry is getting done, but I’ll be making a trip to visit with him soon.

Now, let’s jump across the river and find our way back to Dylan’s “When I Paint My Masterpiece.” I feel fortunate that I’ve seen Dylan perform this song once and have seen him perform live three times in various arenas. The first show was when I was in my early/mid-twenties and soon to be entering my senior year of college. The show would take place on August 3rd, 1997 at Loon Mt. in Lincoln, NH. I had a friend who worked for a local promoter of some sort and he’d secured tickets for myself and another friend, but there was a hitch—we were charged with working security detail along the back fence of the venue. On the day of the show, my friend Jenn and I arrived early and were soon in position at our assigned posts. Before the music even started, we noticed a number of onlookers gathered along the periphery of the fence. Our task was to prevent these non-paying fence jumpers from entering the concert, though they could hear and still see Dylan on the stage below from behind said fence. Keep in mind, Loon Mt is a ski resort and Dylan’s stage was set up at the bottom of the hill while the audience is more or less left to roam the surrounding area. The fence is only a snow fence, you know, one of those flexible orange mesh deals, and, of course, beyond this, stands two less-than-imposing college girls who, like everyone else, were waiting for that first snare drum drop opener to “Like a Rolling Stone.” Two thirds of the way into his 12-song set, the gig was up. Our “Cinderella” smiles and orders to retreat were a flimsy fortress and our handful of fence jumpers made an easy entrance into the concert. Others, who had brought lawn chairs, were content to abide by the rules and stay put behind the orange line.

In the end, Dylan played a total of 15 songs (thank you setlist.com), and this was probably the shortest Dylan concert that I would attend. The next would be years later in Indo, CA for Desert Trip, aptly nicknamed “Oldchella,” in October 2016, and this would be a music festival like no other and certainly made for three of the most amazing and memorable days of my life. Dylan was the opening act and by all accounts, if you looked around the audience, you’d see row upon row of dazzled fans swaying and singing along. But there was a handful of fans who didn’t catch the vibe, one of which I’d had an enounter with several months later in NYC while waiting in line to use the restroom at a sports bar before a Dead & Company show. Upon seeing my Desert Trip shirt, she volunteered her thoughts about Dylan’s performance to which she said, “they needed to get Dylan off the stage.” I suspect Dylan, who had recently been awarded the Noble Prize in Literature, would give such gimcrack opinions no thought at all. That said, I think the issue had much less to do with Dylan’s performance than it had with the venue and the fact that there was a whole lot of palpable, pent up energy on night one of this three-day-long rock extravaganza. The crowd of some 80,000 fans, who’d spent the last several hours sweating through their shirts under the desert sun, were itching to be started up by the Stones. I have to say, this show solidified my opinion that rock & roll’s poet laureate is best enjoyed in a venue that can honor the spiritual intimacy of his lyrics. But I am just one fan, though I base this also on my third and most recent Dylan show, which I attended at The Capitol Theatre.

The Cap is my favorite music venue and is certainly a venue of great rock & roll distinction. And yes, this is where we come full circle with the story, this was the night, November 23rd, 2021, when I finally saw Dylan play “When I Paint My Masterpiece” live. It was hymnal, meditative and all too transitory, then when the first dewy notes of Key West fell on my ears, I wanted to stop time and stay just a little longer in my temporary covid-free bubble of jubilation. I suppose Dylan could’ve played anything that night for my live music-starved ears. I would’ve enjoyed hearing him hum while strumming a cigar box guitar, but I got something sacred and memorable.

When asked about “When I Paint My Masterpiece” in a 2020 interview, Dylan said that he thought the song had “something to do with the classical world, something that’s out of reach. Someplace you’d like to be beyond your experience, ” then went on to add, “even if you do paint your masterpiece, what will you do then? Well, obviously you have to paint another masterpiece.”

Like Dylan, I think a lot of us are at work, in one form or another, be it painting, writing, singing, gardening, playing, parenting, carving or cobbling that thing that we hold so dearly within us. Maybe it will be that masterpiece, but most importanlty it’s that drive to create something, something that is beautiful and is born from within that we can share outside of ourselves, to me, that is the masterpiece.

Beverly Hennessy Summa