Hearts Filled with Gold

I’ve been writing Pedal On columns with Erika Lindemann now since early in the summer. We’ve written about stolen bikes, working bikes, winter riding, BMX and mountain biking, learning to cycle, sharing the road, being thankful, and more. It’s time to talk about giving. Maybe it’s the holiday spirit — no, not hot rum drinks, but the spirit of caring people who create a bike-friendly community. It’s time to open our hearts.

Speaking of hearts, there is a wonderful story about the Basement Tapes, the late ’60s recordings that preceded The Band’s album Music From Big Pink. Bob Dylan wrote some of the songs while recovering from a mysterious motorcycle accident. Big Pink was recorded in the basement of a rural house (painted pink) in upstate New York.

As the band was recording the first song on the album, Tears of Rage, Dylan was living upstairs and writing lyrics. Richard Manuel talks about him coming down to the studio with a piece of typewritten paper, asking, “Have you got any music for this?” Manuel wasn’t always sure what the lyrics meant. But he couldn’t bring himself to run upstairs and ask Bob, “What’s this mean, ‘Now the heart is filled with gold as if it was a purse’?”