Yoko Ono
December 15, 2006
So I’m totally in love with Yoko Ono. I think it started when I was studying postwar history in high school, but it was confirmed once I realized that she was such a talented performance artist. I know very little of her work, but I choose to believe that she’s wonderful.
I don’t think it was meant to have this effect, but one of my memories of love for Yoko is from when I saw Dar Williams in concert once in college. Dar described how she had the reverse opinion of Yoko from everyone else she knew—evidently Dar studied performance/abstract art in college and knew of Yoko primarily in that vein. When she heard about John Lennon, Dar was upset that he and his band were distracting Yoko from her art!
I think that charming story sealed the deal for me. I shed a couple of tears this summer when I was reading a Vogue article about the (by the way, amazingly young-looking and not afraid of showing leg) Ono . . . she said that everything was generally fine, especially when she was around people, but that she still mourned John every day. This was really moving for me. I also saw her accept an award on television once, not too too recently–I think it was right after the war broke out in Iraq. Through lots of tears she talked about how her late husband’s words were still very applicable today . . . all you need is love, etcetera. For me it’s always really comforting to see an established American icon like that, especially a woman – Alison Kraus, Bonnie Raitt, Glenn Close, Lily Tomlin, etc. all have a similar effect on me.
This post is a masterpiece of bad writing, but in light of the current troubles with her driver, and the accusations flying everywhere, I thought about Yoko today and felt a little sad about the whole thing.
