[The Nobel Laureate. Robert Zimmerman, aka Bob Dylan. Source: Google Search.]

Rather than love, than money, than fame, give me truth.

~~Henry David Thoreau

Bob Dylan, American singer and songwriter, will be eighty-three years old on May 24. As I write this I realize that that’s old. True, not old to many people who are going strong at ninety-four. But I’m thinking of Actuarial Tables and Life Insurance statistics. By those yardsticks, Bob is nearly ten years beyond his predicted time.

And he rarely deviates from his schedule of The Never Ending Tour. Say what you wish about his vocal capabilities, he endures.

He admitted to Ed Bradley once that he knows he can no longer write such lyrics as found in Blowin in the Wind. (Which, according to the authorities in Dylanology, he wrote in twenty minutes when he was twenty-one.)

“Does that bother you?” Ed asks.

“Not really. There are other things I can do,” Bob replied.

I wonder if, when I reach his age, I will be doing something somewhat creative. Can I still write a novel? A good short story? A letter to a loved one?

Time will tell.

Years ago, I wrote a blog titled: The Day Bob Dylan Dies. I dread the day when the actual event occurs because Bob has been an important part of my life for around sixty years. That’s a great deal of emotional investment. That’s a boat load of memories. A thousand quotes I can use in a thousand ways.

Here’s what I have done for many years:

When one of my two children (both adults, actually) had a birthday, I would write the following lyric inside their birthday cards:

May you build a ladder to the stars

And climb on every rung.

And may you stay forever young.

I hope they did. I hope I do.

Happy Birthday, Bob !! Stay forever young…for me and for a billion people who love you for your art, poetry and being true to yourself.