So, I’m not going to tonight’s Bob Dylan concert at the Prospect Park Bandshell. Instead my son and a friend are using my tickets. That’s because we’re in Sag Harbor, on a long-planned week away. That’s the real reason we’re not going.

Truth be told, I did consider coming back in for the show (it’s only a two-hour drive). But last month I decided to give the tickets to my son, who is a huge Bob Dylan fan. In a sense, I am passing the baton. Really. It’s his turn to carry the flame for Bob. Mr. Bob. Mr. Bob Bob Dylan (as George Harrison said at the Concert for Bangladesh).

And tonight, he’s expecting a life changing experience. I know how he feels.

When the Bob Dylan tickets went on sale on line back in June I was one of the first to type in Tilden, the special code word that enabled me to buy two $85 dollar tickets.

Expensive yes. But it was Bob Dylan. In my own backyard. Bob Dylan at the Prospect Park Bandshell. Who could resist?

I could tell that Hepcat was dubious about my purchase. He thought it was an awful lot of money. Besides, weren’t we going away that week.

Well, yeh. But it didn’t matter. It was Bob Dylan. In Brooklyn. In my own backyard. The Prospect Park Bandshell. True, we were going to be away the week of August 12th but we weren’t going far. I could always come back to the city for the night from Sag Harbor.

It was Dylan after all.

A little history. Me and Bob Dylan go back, way back. I mean not only is he the voice of my generation, he’s the voice of my life. I’ve been listening to his records and singing his songs for practically my entire life. When I was 11, my parents gave me a vintage leather jacket (from Ridge Furs on 8th Street) and a Bob Dylan songbook.

I loved the little aviator’s jacket. But that songbook. That was my bible for so many years because as a budding singer/songwriter, that was my music.

Don’t Think Twice It’s Alright. Bob Dylan’s Dream. All I Really Want to Do. Blowin’ in the Wind. A Hard Rains’ A Gonna Fall.  This was my music. These were my songs.

And the albums: Freewheeling Bob Dylan. Highway 61 Revisited. Blonde on Blonde. Self Portrait. Nashville Skyline. Blood on the Tracks.

I saw Bob Dylan and the Band at Madison Square Garden, at the Arena in Binghamton, NY, at Radio City Music Hall, at Madison Square Garden with Tom Petty, at Madison Square Garden during his born-again phase, at Madison Square Garden in concert with Joni Mitchell.

I saw Bob Dylan on 8th Avenue in Park Slope across the Street from the Montauk Club back in 1999 on y son’s birthday and I asked him for an autograph. He obliged and signed his name on the back of an American Express billing envelope. Luckily I didn’t mail it.

About a year later my son bought me The Definitive Bob Dylan Songbook for my birthday. He’d told me for days that "I’d probably start to cry when I opened it." And he was right. I did start to cry because I was very touched.

So tonight he goes to his first Bob Dylan show. He knows that Dylan can barely sing anymore. That you can’t recognize the songs because Dylan changes the tunes. My son told me that Dylan may do an all-piano show and he won’t be playing guitar or harmonica (not sure where he heard that).

My son is ready for anything and I’m happy he’s going. Which doesn’t mean I don’t want to be there because I do. But I’m passing on the baton, the baton. Passing on the baton.