Childless Parents Newsletter, Autumn 2020

Newsletter for Childless Parents | www.tcf.org.uk 9 Music has an amazing way of connecting people; it certainly worked its magic on Dylan. I remember once when we were flying out to Brazil on a visit, he’d be about 7, I think, I bought him a Walkman at the airport. On the plane a young American man sat next to us. Dylan was plugged into his Walkman, his dear head bobbing to his music. The man asked him what he was listening to. Dylan told him. I can’t remember what he said, but I clearly remember the guy being surprised and then asking had he heard of Queen. Dylan said Oh, yeah, but I haven’t got a tape. Well!, as if by magic, this lovely guy rummaged about in the bag at his feet, and produced a tape of Queens Greatest Hits, including our favourite Bohemian Rhapsody, and handed it to Dylan. It went straight into the Walkman. A connection was made. I’ll always remember that day. As Dylan got older, of course, his interests developed, and new discoveries in music were made. By the time he started buying his own music, CDs had come on the market and players were acquired – a full kit in his bedroom, a portable one for his school bag, and ‘mum, we need to buy a new car, so we can have a cd player for when we go out’. Very quickly the tables turned. I’d hear his music blaring from his bedroom. Sometimes I’d recognise bands - Bob Marley, Led Zeppelin, Nirvana, Guns ‘n Roses - and other times I’d stop what I was doing and think, ‘yeah!, I like that’. So, I’d go upstairs and he’d tell me all about the band, the singer. Sitting on his bed with my boy is a lasting and precious memory. Later, in his late teens and early twenties, he went to gigs, mostly in London, with friends, and a few times on his own. If he wanted to take in a gig, nothing would stop him. By this time, he had amassed a huge collection of music, and he’d started streaming. Illegal sites, I fear, but it was how he’d find new genres and invariably end up buying the CD. Much like his mother, he enjoyed holding the cover, reading, following the lyrics, while listening. More often now, he’d wear earphones that completely covered his ears, so I lost out on a lot of his music but he did introduce me to Nelly Furtado, Ziggy Marley, Kosheen, and others. There was an amazing day when, Dylan must’ve been around 18, he came with us to see Jethro Tull. In a theatre, comfy seats, no standing and so on; a very different gig for him. There were a few younger people in the audience, not many! To my absolute joy, Dylan loved it and was blown away by the flute. It was so good to realise we still could connect over a love for music. In his twenties, Dylan started to collect LPs. Oxford had a fantastic shop that sold records of every genre. Dylan had become interested in Jazz as well by then - I think my father may have given him a taste for it - so a collection of LPs joined the CD collection. He made sure he recorded all of his music onto his iPod for his travels, and we had the dubious pleasure of finding room in the loft for yet more of Dylan’s assorted belongings. In 2015, Dylan came home to us. He’d not only broken his neck in a downhill mountain bike race, his heart had been broken by his long time Kiwi girlfriend. He’d had to spend around 4-6 months in recovery in his home in Dunedin, and had had a lot of time to explore the internet for music, and so his collection increased. Having him home again was wonderful and, in the end, fortuitous. I could see how much Dylan had grown up, from a youth into a 30 year-old man. His passionate spirit still shone, and his personality had matured.