Bob Dylan's secret track and the Venice Artisans

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My Brothers and some of the creative Venice gang began doing custom remodel work at Bob Dylan's house. 

Bob was so impressed with the craftsmanship of their artistry that he took the whole group fishing. I can only imagine that while there on that fishing trip the older boys entertained the troops with famous and infamous Dahlin stories while hauling in halibut, bonita, sea bass, and yellow-tail off the Santa Monica coast. 

From there, I image how Bob Dylan might have wrote the song on the secret track (3) of his Self Portrait album - about leaving little Markie D behind at Salton Sea.  

In the epic 7 part series that began on the first day of fifth grade.

part 2 Life without Sunscreen

part 3 Where things go to die

part 4 Half-a-piece-of-bacon and vanishing

part 5 Chasing taillights and Left Behind 

part 6 The Mud covered refugee and the High-Speed Chase

part 7 The Cheese Burger and the Happy Reunion 

Karin with floaties 

Me flexing in background (on the weekend of the fateful trip) 

Bob Dylan probably heard the funny stories and might have even pee'd himself - not sure about that - but it could have happened that way and then proceeded to write this song. 

Here are some pictures to keep you occupied until my next post (coming soon). 

 Backyard 

our front yard... 

 three broken bones at one time 

  Nana to the left and "The Quaker" far rear of picture 

Fishing with Bob Dylan was true - the telling of Dahlin Stories - certain, and the song was possible at least in his head (probably recorded in an alternate universe).

 *

The question still remains: Why did mom send me to Europe? I didn't really want to go. I wanted to hang out and go to the beach with friends and maybe connect with Andrea, so I didn't really understand.  

 Mom sending me off. 1971 at LAX leaving for Europe look at my enthusiasm.  Joy! (sarcasm). 

* Photo Credit: Bob Dylan with Fish [The Dylan Group]   

How Not to Exact Revenge

(Continued from last time: The Kingdom Hall, the Hypothetical Hippie and the old Venice train)

PLAN: "XYZ"

After getting rolled in the dirt and being embarrassed, I'm not too sure that Tommy had much of an interest in being a member of the Troop 32 ruffians.  Jeffery, on the other hand, was looking for something that pushed the edge of the envelop and was a little beyond the pay-grade of being a Lennon. He could wet his appetite for dangerous living by hanging out with me at my house, "Hotel Crazy," and cut his teeth on adventure by joining The sickness of this rowdy troop from Venice.

BUT FOR NOW - it was all about PAYBACK! My older brother, Chewbacca, had drawn all over my body with a Marks-a-Lot and derailed my chances of finding out about love: HE HAD TO PAY and I had a plan!

When Jeffery sneaked over to my house, he was as giddy as a little kid the night before Christmas with the thought about handling snakes and dead things that were being preserved in our freezer.

The house was quiet because hippie Wolf Pack was out back in the ivy cave smoking it up and mom was locked in her bedroom. Like paleontologists, the first thing we had to do was chip out one of the two dead Diamondback rattlesnakes that were frozen in the glacier of the refrigerator frost (that we had found at Leo Carrillo state park in Malibu) .

Picking away at the thick ice crystals with an ice pick and a heavy metal spoon we scooped out loads of the snow and began eating the stuff.  Chipping away at the snake skins, Jeffery and I shoved gobs of the delicious fluffy white refrigerator snow in our mouths...gobs and gobs of it ...and even made snow balls and threw them at Chewbacca's gross pigeon that lived on top of the refrigerator.

Jeffery was in heaven - nothing like this would ever take place at his house.  We threw freezer snow balls at the flying one-eye'd" parasite carrier and shoved more of the fluffy frost into our mouths UNTIL...

...UNTIL I got a bite that tasted like it had made contact with the dead rattler... I guess it could just have been tainted with the rancid blood of old chicken but my overactive mind conjured up snake guts that incited my superpowers; heaving and gagging I ran to the vomitorium.  Jeffery laughed and continued to dislodge the old rattler carcass from the freezer as he listened to me throw up my guts in the bathroom.  I was a hot mess





So much for payback. Chewbacca, was already winning and he was out back getting high with Bob Dylan and friends - It's not like Bob Dylan was out in our backyard. It's just that they were just doing what Bob said, "Everybody must get stoned." They were smoking the infamous "Mexican tomato plants" which gave us time to lay our devious little trap.






















In order for our plan to work we had to thaw the thing, so I made Jeffery put the snake under his shirt - he loved it and thought it was groovy - but I put a rubber band about the mouth of the snake so the fangs wouldn't accidentally poison him with deadly venom.  

With the snake warming under his shirt, we headed up stairs to the third floor bedrooms of the Wolf Pack and to the (not so secure) snake cages!  I didn't want to kill any one really...just put the fear of God into Chewbacca, so I didn't mess with the rattlesnake cages. I did however make a nice soft warm nest right in the middle of Chewbacca's bed.  Pulling back the covers, I carefully placed one garter snake at a time in a pile of snakes I would leave for Chewbacca to discover when he came stumbling to bed.

Where Plan XYZ gets really good is that we were going to take the thawing rattlesnake and place it among the living ones.  My hope is that with all the slithering and movement from the real snakes he would think that the rattler was alive and have a complete conniption fit and go crazy!

When Jeffery put the warm rattlesnake in the mix the other snakes freaked out - and wouldn't you know it - in the panic - one bit me in the arm!             DANG IT!             This payback better be worth it!

I was hoping the Wolf Pack would turn on each other and that a ruckus would break out on the third floor. In the middle of the night I expected to hear the the sweet sounds of this delicious payback!

I climbed into my loft bed near the place where the ooze was released from the pit of hell and smiled as I fell asleep.

And it happened just as I planned!  I heard a screech that sounded just like the girls did when the older boys took them to the Albino camp... I heard the boys yell at Chewbacca...I heard a  wrestling match break out on the third floor. YES!  PERFECT! All was right and good in the world (only Jeffery was home and missing all the fun)... UNTIL...

...UNTIL...I heard my name!  "MARKKKKKKKKKKKKK!" came the bitter sounding screech from the third floor.  "I'm going to kill you. You little twerp!"

Footsteps!  Lots of them coming down the stairs and heading my direction. I was trapped!

The boys grabbed me, stripped me down to my tightie-whities, tied a stand of Christmas lights around my ankles and hung me out the second story window!

Luckily it wasn't long, but there I hung until morning. Mom walked under me and mumbled something about the "pain of mortal sin" and when Jeffery stepped outside his house and saw me hanging nearly naked he knew that PLAN XYZ was an epic fail and that being a Lennon wasn't so bad after all.

When the mom who drove the Saint Mark's advanced-math kids to Saint Monica's in the morning pulled up and saw me hanging there she - burned rubber and sped away to Santa Monica as fast as she could!

My only hope was to pull some kind of Houdini and escape before Andrea would see me in my underwear on her way to school.        This was certainly not the way to exact revenge.            
                                                 YOU WON THIS ONE CHEWBACCA!



I guess it was a good thing My dad and mom had prepared me for this when I was young.

   
So you know what, "What doesn't kill you makes you stronger" or something...

  ...or SOMETHING!

All I know was that I was still trying to figure out what this love word was all about.  Clueless in Venice!

The Night I killed a Hippie and the Pope was Proud

(continued) Tuesday Evening: Though my brain had been consumed in thoughts about sex (now that I knew something), I managed to apply some unused gray matter to come up with a plan at getting back at Chewbacca for marking up my body. However, I would not be able to employ my devious plan at the moment, it would have to wait until after my Boy Scout meeting - because snakes have this propensity for crawling away. I would have to put the ooze inspired plan of payback into action after coming back from my Boy Scout meeting tonight.



In an effort to recruit by neighbor buddies, Tommy Blaser and Jeffery Lennon, to join troop 32, I invited them to come me over at the scout house by bribing them with some "Dahlin" deviousness. I told them that we could put some pennies on the railroad tracks that ran along West Washington Blvd.

I know this temptation of dangerous living was out of their normal comfort zone and was attractive to the male psyche that is naturally Wild at Heart.

 *

Between you and me, I think Steppenwolf was on to something and believe that is why so many people liked hanging out our house - because we were so out of control. People could come over to our house, handle snakes, fight against our attack rooster, get close to danger with our alligator, get electrocuted if they wanted to or not, smoke marijuana, maybe even come close to a confrontational encounter with the cops and then return to the safety of their normal lives.

That's why our house was such a popular hang out spot in Venice! It was the center of the universe!


With my pockets filled with pennies and my two friends filled with mischievous optimism we headed down Woodlawn towards the railroad tracks at West Washington. We wanted to make the most of it knowing that the train inched along the tracks with less and less regularity - but this was going to be our night.

We heard the clatter of the train and hurriedly ran down to where "X marks the spot." After some coaxing I got Tommy to join me and Jeffery in strategically lining up our soon to be copper souvenirs on the cold metal rail and took cover. Our imaginations were on overload from all the stories we had heard about pennies being shot out and piercing through cars and killing people. This was bound to be one of these events where Mrs. Blaser would line us up and have the, "If-Mark-were-to-jump-from-a-ten-story-building, it-doesn't-mean-that-you-have-to-Tommy" speech.  

Anyway, the slow train was coming down the tracks and we hid behind some old car so that we didn't get killed and as the train passed, shucks, no copper missiles shot in our direction and the train didn't derail. It was kind of a bummer that no one got hurt - to a Dahlin it always made the story better. A couple pennies had fallen off, two were missing and one indeed had been transformed into the thin-oval, squished-copper memento that we had hoped for.  

That's when we spotted the guitar - an abandoned guitar in the bushes on the other side of the tracks.

The strings were intact and there was no reason to throw a perfectly good guitar away... UNLESS...one of our pennies shot out and killed the owner. Our imaginations ran wild and we began telling a story that grew like Dr. Seuss' kid on Mulberry street.

It was a hippie who owned the guitar chasing fortune and fame on his way to Hollywood when he suddenly got hit by a copper bullet and died. "It might have been Bob Dylan" Tommy said. I thumped him on the noggin and said, "No, Bob Dylan is still alive - don't you know anything? Don't you know about the birds and the bees and sex and stuff like that?"

Turns out they did - darn it!

Building the story, Jeff said, our hypothetical hippie was singing a love song to his hippie chick and in the middle of his ballad, he was so focused and enamored - looking deep into her big brown eyes- that he didn't see the train coming and WHAM! He shouted causing Tommy to jump! We all laughed, but then went silent for minute thinking that we may have been responsible for killing someone as though we were at the guys funeral or contemplating a life sentence in prison.  We search for blood - couldn't find any and picked up the lonely guitar. 

Half of the irony of this whole thing was that begin related to the Famous Lennon Sisters (and though it seemed as if every single Lennon in the history of the world could sing) neither Tommy and Jeffery could sing a lick. That's understandable for us Dahlins - none of us...not one of us could sing - expect for my Dad. And none of us - not one Dahlin had the raw talent for playing an instrument...of any kind (even though my older brother could play a folded leaf). Hence the mountainous stack of old instruments that cluttered the entry into our old house near the cussing mynah-bird. The other half of the irony was that it was me, of all people, who brought the gift of music to the younger generations of Lennons, like Kippy and Michael, with my air guitar renditions of silly songs that I performed in the Blaser's backyard. Kippy and Michael did not want to appear on the Lawrence Welk show - NO... they wanted to be a rock star like Markie D.     

Anyway, as the oldest member of our impish adventurers, I picked up the guitar and began an imitation of the last love song of the murdered hippy for my two cohorts.  I had the boys in stitches, but this wasn't enough. Adrenaline was pumping through the veins of our pre-pubescent bodies and felt like we needed to find more trouble. 

"AH-HA" came the collective epiphany when we looked across the street and saw people in suit and ties entering the old  brick-faced Kingdom Hall building that was mostly hidden by thick green overgrowth. The door was open and we were attracted like mosquitoes to the light. After the doors shut we went over to put on a show or I went went over, strumming the guitar to put on a show for Tommy and Jeffery AND of course this had to be authorized by the POPE since this whole Jehovah Witness thing had to be a cult not sanctioned by the Catholic Church (I knew that when I stood in front of Mrs. Lennon or Mrs. Blaser at the inquisition... I could roll my eyebrows into the look of innocence and claim to be fulfilling my duty as a canonized saint for which - it was Tommy and Jeffery's catholic-bound duty to jump off the 10 story building with me. How could the best of Catholic mothers reason against the POPE). 

Facing my audience (of two) with my back to the front doors, I wailed in the loudest version of the "Kingdom Hall Blues." I had the kids in stitches and think Tommy pee'd his pants...when the doors swung open and a hand shot out and collared me. 

My days were numbered. Two other men came around behind Tommy and Jeffery and the three of them invited us in. INVITED US IN?  They escorted us in with phony smiles. It was more like a kidnapping. We were ushered down front of the little building and directed to sit in the front pew. We were trapped like rats! This is what must have happened to our long lost hippie friend. This must be how they recruit - they leave things as bait and they make prisoners of their captives until you put on a suit and tie and become one of them. 

I have no idea what the guy was saying about Jehovah (Who-ever that was) and how he had two sons: one Michael and one Lucifer - it was all too complicated, especially since the three couldn't stop giggling. Tommy made sure to keep showing us the wet spot on his the front of his pants near his taliwacker. He was doing a good job of messing up their Mass...or what-ever-it was and this is when I decided to drive a nail in the coffin and make a run for it. 

I picked up my (murdered-hippie love-ballad) guitar, jumped up right in the middle of center isle, faced all the people, strummed away and put on the performance of a lifetime.  THEN RAN!  I ran out of the doors with Tommy and Jeffery closely drafting behind.  Mrs. Blaser should be happy because we knew that THE POPE WOULD BE PROUD!  

After boy scouts tonight - it would be Chewbacca's big surprise!    Bwahahahaha.  

Kipp, Tom, Jeff, Kevin, and Michael on the front stairs of the Harding house.  

* "Born to-be wild-steppenwolf-45" by Source. Licensed under Fair use via Wikipedia - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Born_to-be_wild-steppenwolf-45.jpg#mediaviewer/File:Born_to-be_wild-steppenwolf-45.jpg

The Last Supper only with Jalapenos

I apologize that it has been about a million years since I have had a minute to sit down and write another post. It is just after Mother's Day, but I strongly urge that none of you moms read this latest post!

This was one of those very horrible pranks that was much more than just a practical joke. Instead, it was  more like something Jack Bauer would do on the TV show 24 to interrogate a terrorist. (I was reminded of this story by someone who had told me his firsthand eyewitness account, when I was last down in Southern California).

The only thing I can't be sure of is the exact date. I can get close, however, by the diligent investigative historical analysis of source criticism (I will pick the year 1963: 1. Because our pool had to be up and operational i.e before the alligator, before Veloci-rooster 2. It was during a period that the back patio was clean 3. The pool also must have been clean and not a greenish-mosquito breeding swamp - 4. It had to be after the time this person began hanging around, if he was an eyewitness... I'm feeling like a New Testament scholar or something like that).

Anyway, my parents were were throwing a big bash in the backyard that had been decorated in a Hawaiian theme for the neighbors (that's why it had to be before the crazy Veloci-Raptor-attack rooster). I remember the decorations of fishing nets, cork buoys and palm trees. Sorry for borrowing from the Queen's English, but it was a "hoity-toity" affair and us young kids were not allowed. They had a record player and an open bar and I spied on the event from a clandestine spot from my mother's bedroom window, which had the perfect view.

I know what a lot of you are thinking already, "Don't tell me that a member of the notorious Wolf Pack threw you out of the window?" NO!  It was worst than that - at least to an seven-year-old kid, it was!

This was the end of a bad year...our Catholic President had been assassinated - the Vietnam war was escalating and  Frank Sinatra Jr had just been kidnapped up by Lake Tahoe somewhere. The whole world was mad - maybe that explains this whole incident - maybe this wasn't my brother's fault - maybe something was just wrong with the world. Or maybe a couple of the older boys were mad that they couldn't come downstairs to the party and somehow figured they'd get back at my parents or perhaps it was that they could still be the center of attention, though locked far away in the proverbial "tower."

I was minding my own business, as I spied on my parent's party below, when I was jumped on and attacked by a couple brothers. I fought back, but couldn't take all three of them. Marvel comics had just come out with this new super hero person called Iron Man, and boy, do I wish I was made of steel, so I had a chance of fighting back and so that that my human exterior could have withstood their devious plot. But I wasn't, and my outside was made of skin instead like any regular 'O person and I couldn't fight them off.

Let's just put it this way - what happened next - ended the party when everyone... not just everyone at the party, but everyone in the entire neighborhood heard the painful and blood curdling screeching as though they had heard the death cry of 7-year-old succumbing to advanced interrogation at Quantanamo!

Helppppp!


 I'll finish this one tomorrow - but mommas, be warned and do not let the tender ears of your children hear this story or you just might risk the fact that they might be scarred for life...      

"Judas, do what you must do quickly"

   

Karl Dahlin: The Eulogy I Should Have Given!

At the memorial celebration that followed the funeral service for my second oldest brother, Karl (in the Dahlin Family house), afterwards, I had many people look in my direction urging me to share a story or two.  In my mind I wrestled with all the stories that I had spinning around in my head that could adequately capture the essence of Karl. The dilemma I had was trying to come up with THE ONE BEST STORY of the hundreds of memories that flooded my thoughts at that moment.

This time together was about celebrating his life, drawing closure and neatly putting things in categories that help us deal with the passing of a loved one. I walked away with regret that my brain couldn't produce something to share in the moment.  Then I spent an entire day beating myself up for such an epic fail.  

THEN IT CAME!  Unfortunately, it came to me at 2:29am smack dab in the middle of the night, 37 hours too late. 

Let me begin by asserting my premise right up front in one small phrase; The Power of CONNECTION and Beauty of authentic messy COMMUNITY!

When I looked around at the faces in that backyard I was overwhelmed by the real sense of community that we all shared and how each person there had a story that connected them to Karl, which in turn connected us all to each other. Wow! Although I had a million Dahlin stories there also were Blaser stories, and Lennon stories, and Tripp stories, and Nargie stories, and Grant stories, and McClain stories and Daniel stories and Irvine stories and Dugan stories and Sasson stories and Koz and Charlie and Jack and John and Tom and Ray and Ian and Greg and Tuna canyon and Sycamore canyon and Dogtown and Jeff Ho and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar stories and Bob Dylan stories... 

(pictured to the left is Bob Dylan in Red Shirt - with Karl, Kurt and Bob). 

...and the crazy Rooster stories. There were stories that took place in Venice and in Marina Del Rey and at Bass lake; stories that included Bob Furhman and Pinky Parlette and our very SPECIAL TWINS - David and Lisa. 

There are stories of the “hooch-hut” out back at “Wall Drug” and pool stories and electrocution stories and boat stories and Fish Stories – that connect us all to Karl and all to each other.  

When I look at Karl’s kids – I see his love for fishing that will live on. I see his creativity and how the skill of craftsmanship had been passed down to David along with the blonde hair of his youth.  With Michael Jon, I see the sensitive heart of Karl that endured him to so many people. When I look at Karlee I see his eyes and his beautiful thick hair and the strength of character. I marveled at how if you took all three of them and squished them together into one person you would get Karl.  Together they embody who he is - his life lives through them and his legacy lives through all of us who were blessed to be a part of those stories.

OH, I HAVE STORIES! Plenty of them. 

Stories like:      Letting monkeys out of the Zoo 
                        The infamous Veloci-Raptor

                                                            Johnny the pigeon

                                                            Lazarus the cat
                                                            Poochie the "Wonder Dog" 

                                                            Halloween and the Saints 

                                                            Sawing his 57 Ford in half for a dune buggy

                                                            The Alligator

                                                            The Mexican Tomato Plants

Hollister

                                                            Fishing

                                                            Nearly being killed in a storm at sea

                                                            Grandpa the giant, chick-eating bullfrog

                                                            “Haircut Saturdays”

                                                             Being chased out of Lancaster

                                                             Kings River

                                                            The storm at Salton Sea

                                                            Pranks on poor old Edna next door. 

                                                            Stealing Avocados

                                                            Wresting in the front yard

                                                            “Templates”

                                                            Albino Camp hikes

                                                            Cross country trips and Dad's 67 Ford Squire

                                                            President Johnson and snapping turtles

                                                            Red ants 

                                                            Horticulture

                                                            Stained glass windows

                                                            Kitchen cabinets

                                                            Leaky boats

                                                            Rebellious boat motors

                                                            Softball..."Pinners" 

                                                            Shared Birthday parties

                                                            Broken bones - lots and lots of them!

                                                            Boxing matches in the living room

                                                            Listening to the Beatles and the Beach Boys

                                                            Dancing in the living room

                                                            Milk Wars

                                                            Reptiles 
                                                            Rattlesnake escapes...

…stories and stories and more stories – BUT, what I realized when I looked around was - what a great reminder that there is probably no neighborhood in America THEN or NOW where there will ever be so many people in a unique mix of bizarre, funny, flawed, adventurous, risk taking, loving community of real people who are still connected in such a beautiful and powerful demonstration of what it means to be truly human!

  

Karl, I miss you more today than I did yesterday… you will be a part of us forever…and part of an amazing story that can never be duplicated with a legacy that is etched into our hearts, forged into our memories and cherished as we continue to tell our stories (no matter how embellished) that will assure you will never be forgotten and serve to remind us to cherish the relationships we have. We had something very special on Harding Avenue and we still have that powerful connection and sense of beautiful-messiness of community.  

Thank you to all who attended, to all those offering heart felt thoughts, and for all the prayers and condolences.

Karl, you were there when I came into the world and it was my great honor to be with you when you left this one!   

With Love, your baby “Birthday” brother… Mark!