Before I begin let me apologize for the length of this post and thank you if you actually read it.
https://www.artsy.net/article/artsy-editorial-yoko-onos-5-iconic-works
I want to wish Yoko Ono such a happy birthday. I am wondering when the video above was filmed? If that's Yoko at 92---holy wow.!!!! Reason I say that is because my one of my own parents passed a few weeks ago and their ninety third birthday would have been next week. Yes, a year older, but might as well have been ten years older by comparison if that is Yoko at 92!
In 1980 I was a young teen who had just gotten into the Beatles; John was my immediate favorite. I quickly accumulated so many Beatles and solo post-Beatles albums on vinyl at yard sales and the mall. I loved them all, from the White Album to All Things Must Pass, from Band on the Run to Ringo's hits. Of them all, I was obsessed with the entire "Imagine" album especially the song John wrote for his mother. I collected and read everything I could get my hands on about all the four lads from Liverpool, and my heart skipped more than a beat over the enchanting story of how John met Yoko. He'd visited her installation at an avant garde art show....one of her canvases was mounted to the ceiling; for anyone interested to view it, there was a ladder to climb, which of course John did. The canvas appeared blank, but there was a magnifying glass with which to examine it. John took a look, and found the word "Yes" painted in minuscule letters. I was immediately hooked on learning everything about their relationship. The famous press conference where they were interviewed lying in their bed. Both of them naked, covered with a brown paper sleeve, on their first album together. John naked, clinging to a fully clothed Yoko on the cover of Rolling Stone magazine.
I of course felt terrible for his then-wife Cynthia and even more for their son Julian (who I was lucky enough to see perform once in the late 1990s; being nearly the spitting image of a young John, I experienced chills up and down my spine when he walked on to the stage.) And, of course, my heart ached for Yoko, too!, many years later when I learned how rocky their own relationship had been. My knowledge of John's life experiences and the trauma bond I felt I had with him (actually both of them) made the fact that he was unfaithful to her unsurprising.. In many ways the trauma(s) intersected with my own. The pain was so raw, so real.
My already strong love and respect for Yoko grew in power; that their relationship remained, was to me, some kind of comfort. I was the record store in November 1980, less than weeks before John bled to death in front of their apartment building, The Dakota, to be one of the first to grab his first studio album in years, "Milk and Honey". I nearly wore it out in those 21 days, eating up John and Yoko's new sings with a big spoon, cherishing John's joy in parenting their son Sean. The song Beautiful Boy brought tears to me eyes every time and Yoko's (as always) bad bitch energy was so powerful I could feel it in my very young bones.
I turned thirteen the month "Milk and Honey" was released; I had no emotional defenses to protect myself from the long lasting grief issuing forth at 4:00 am or so on Tuesday December 9, when, as it did every day, my clock radio alarm snapped on. I didn't really know who Larry King was, but I'd accidentally discovered his radio show recently and found the interviews interesting enough to listen to. In my sleepy haze I thought I'd heard him talking about John Lennon and Yoko Ono. I remember smiling to myself, thinking "Oh, what have those two done now?" But like a thunderbolt---I KNEW. My parent remembered awakening to my blood-curdling screaming. I remember crying and crying as they hugged and tried to comfort me. " It was a terrible, terrible accident...It was a crazy guy with a gun.." 1980. John's death was the actual end of my childhood. I had to grow up to figure out how to coexist in such a world. ((Who could have imagined what was coming down the pike??))
Ironically, it was John and Yoko who I looked to. I'd especially loved learning all about and felt so gratified by their daring and creative protests against the evils of war and fascism. Their brazen comfort in their own skins; their demands for action on human rights; their truth telling to power absolutely galvanized me! I'd felt so bewildered and indignant as a child; John and Yoko were the first to speak to the "Kids are People Too" narrative I'd only dreamed of. This was my earliest exploration of what would become of a lifetime of activism; learning about what John and Yoko did planted those seeds.
I learned from Yoko what avant-garde art was, and what it meant. From the first time I heard Yoko, the obviousness that her vocals were (and still are) hard to listen to was the most important part of the message. I heard in her shrieks and screams my own pain and hopelessness and those suffering and being killed. And John's mighty guitar was like a megaphone demanding Yoko be heard. She wouldn't stop, and he amplified her voice. It was a vindication of my (and the world's!) need for peace and understanding! Their willingness to give voice to the painful parts of their lives and work through their traumas through art was (and still is) life changing and inspirational.
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