Party Conversation

Viðey, 9 October, 2012

An old friend and I we talking at a recent holiday party.

Our conversation drifted toward Christmas songs. She said she hated most of them, the modern ones especially, how empty they were, except for Merry Xmas, War is Over. When I mentioned that I had seen Yoko Ono last year she became very interested. I told her about the Imagine Peace Tower and how I, along with hundreds of people from all over the world, gathered on an island in the Reykjavík bay, on a rainy October night, and about how Yoko humbly spoke about John’s legacy, and about world peace and health and living in harmony. When I spoke of when they began playing John’s Imagine and people began to sing along I began to get a little choked up. I described how the base of the light was circled with white tiles engraved with the word Imagine in hundreds of languages, and her how the light started up in sections, ultimately creating a massive light tower touching the clouds above.

She said she wished she could have been there.



I didn’t tell of after the ceremony how I wandered around the nearly pitch-black island. Or about finding the small building where they sold beer and had a duo playing folk tunes, and people came in to warm up a little. Of how dream-like it all was, strange yet peaceful.



Waiting for the ferry was another dream. I didn’t speak of that either, for the subtle magic of the scene was impossible to describe.