BOWLERS in HISTORY

Today I thought about John Lennon. I thought about how his father Alfred Lennon met his mother Julia in Sefton Park, which is a very beautiful park. I thought about how Julia was sitting on a wrought-iron bench. I thought about how Alfred was wearing a bowler and carrying a cigarette holder. And he had rickets. And he was 5’4”. I thought about she said that he looked ‘silly’ and about how he said that she looked ‘lovely.’ I thought about how he was 15, about how she was 14. I thought about how, when she told him to take off his hat, he threw it into the lake. I wondered about what Julia thought when she saw the hat floating in the lake. I wondered if she laughed. I thought about a little black hat and a little English man. And I wondered if he had not taken off his hat, and if he hadn’t thrown it in the lake, whether or not teenagers would faint in 1964, watching the Ed Sullivan Show, on tiny, tiny, black and white tvs, turned up really loud and whether or not mothers and fathers would call upstairs, ask if everything was all right, and wonder what exactly was going on.

Today I wondered where the hat is now.