day 9: tulsa: woody guthrie center and bob dylan center

We spent all day in the Woody Guthrie Center and the Bob Dylan Center, and we are going back tomorrow. It was a profound and intense experience for me. I do want to write about the Centers -- what they house, the creative and engaging ways the information is presented -- but I need to process it more before I do.

I was choked up and teary-eyed by so much in the Woody exhibits. It's hard for me to explain how much he means to me. 

There are certain historical figures that I call my great "my great heroes," because I can't find a better expression. These are people who I feel close to in a spiritual way. That word, spiritual, often implies religion and some kind of belief in an immortality, but, as wmtc readers know, I am an atheist and completely irreligious. For me the word means feeling part of something larger than oneself -- of feeling, finding, needing a deep purpose and meaning in one's life. 

So when I say someone is my great hero, it isn't merely that I admire them, although obviously I do. It's that I actually feel they are part of me, that their life helps me and guides me. One of those people is Joni Mitchell. And one of them is Woody Guthrie. 

Allan and I toured the exhibits together today, and were often laughing or shaking our heads in awe together. I sensed that Allan had the same reaction in the Dylan Center that I had in the Woody Center: being so moved that it is nearly overwhelming. And while I don't think of Bob Dylan in the very personal way that I think of Joni or Woody, I have been listening to his music deeply for 50 years, and have always been in awe of his outsized talents. 

A more practical and (maybe) less emotional review tomorrow.