Bo Diddley Day!

George Bush can go to hell (and surely will, anyway).

For that matter, MasterCard and Visa can go to hell, and all those with hearts like a five-year-old walnut are secure in their reservations too. I’m done with it all, with struggle and bitterness. Besides, we can always crank that up if needed. For now, phooey on everyone who doesn’t give a damn about life and nature and the eternal drumbeat of love. I’M GOING TO SEE BO DIDDLEY TONIGHT at the Lensic Theater in Santa Fe. My own ticket to heaven is assured. St. Peter will lean down, peer into my eyes, and ask, with garlic and tomato on his breath:

“So … have you ever been DIDDLED?”

And I’ll say, “Oh yessir, you bet, absolutely,” then beat out that special rhythm on my thigh.

This pilgrimage, for that’s what it is, involves almost four hours of driving a 17-year-old pickup through a long canyon and over broad stretches of open country. It also takes me through the lowrider capital of New Mexico, past half a dozen Indian casinos, and down into LatteLand. In the same trip, I’ll see more doublewides with tires on the roofs and fancy SUVs with tires on the road than anyone would ever think could co-exist in the same space and time without fomenting violent revolution. Is this a great country or what?

The question (NOT rhetorical!) is actually irrelevant. The “country” is irrelevant! This is a state of being I’m talking about, one in which the thump of one man’s soul is counts more than any ideology or fake lines on a map that can’t be seen from space.

This is Bo Diddley Day and I’m going. Liberation for all, and to all, a good night.