Deja Vu-ish

The totally not greatly exaggerated demise of My Hero, is a lot like when Jerry died; whether it is true or not, it's (at least feels like) the end of an era and a new beginning. I remember Andy and I trekked down to the City the weekend of Jerry's memorial concert.

You have to be a baddass to rock a Warlock. I play a Telecaster.

We were as poor as we are now, if not worse, and we had to hijack his Chevy Nova from the driveway of his parents house (even tho we were grown men). As we drove away Andy told me that the lie he told his dad was transparent and that "he knew", but I was selfish that day and probably said something like "It's gonna be cool, bro." The car had been sitting for a while, the paint faded, and even when it was running good, it still was not that good. Even tho we were grown men at the time, even tho we shoulda known better, we had the choice of (maybe) breaking down somewhere in BFE, or if the Gods so chose, making to this epic concert for that guitar player-that even guitar players like ourselves, admired (we are a selfish bunch, and hardly dish out kudos or compliments).

The car was ugly, rusted and untrustworthy. It had a sticker on the bumper tied on with twine that said "Awesome." When we went over the bay bridge I cursed the suspension because I was trying to roll a joint, and I only had a small amount of mushrooms, a joints worth of weed and maybe, just maybe enuff beer money for me and my equally alcoholic friend for part of the day. "This is gonna be so epic, bro," I proclaimed when I finished rolling our days only joint. "What," Andy tried to say over the blaring Grateful Dead music playing on his crap stereo and I just shook my head.

Well it's turns out the concert sucked. Previously we had been to the really epic Bill Graham memorial concert in Golden Gate Park (the best concert of my life, evah) and we thought we were in for more of the same. At the Bill Graham Memorial Santana played, Los Lobos, Robin Williams did comedy, Journey played, John Fogerty played Creedence songs with the Dead backing him up...and then the Dead played. That was the day of days. When those propeller driven planes flew over head and dropped red and white carnations all over the crowd, while the Dead were playing sugar Magnolia, and also while I was on a bathroom run, but I stopped to meet a redheaded, 19 y/o legal assistant (and we hugged and jumped for joy as the flowers rained down on us), I thought to myself "I will always, always remember this." Unfortunately this particular concert didn't go down like that.

Did I mention that I took three kinds of acid this day...and had the time of times.

We thought that the most epic bands were going to turn up but instead it was the essence of bands that used to be good with only one or two remaining members of the original band. Part of Dead shows was also how awesome the crowd was. The crowd was lame. After surveying the situation we decided to eat what little mushrooms we had...then we had a bad trip.

We decided fuck this "let's get outta here" so we got back into the jalopy to head back to Sac Town. "Let's go thru Haight and check it out." Fo sho, after all what would be a trip to the City, for guys like us, without going to the Haight.

I recall that the sun was out and that we had the windows rolled down. We both acknowledged that the shrooms were not "schrooming" so we decided to smoke the one joint that we had...oh, but it broke in my pocket and was unsalvageable. We had long ago drank all the beer, because there is never enuff beer for two guys like us and we cruiseded Haight Street smoking cloves (I smoked cloves back then.).

The streets were packed with jaywalkers. It seemed like there was no rhyme or reason, much less cross walks. The street was packed with cars also, apparently everyone had the same idea as us, and traffic moved at, like, 5mph (really). Hippies traversed between the slow moving cars like zombies, and so many of them, I can't emphasize how many people were in the street, and many many many said out loud "What am I going to do." Cloves smoke for a long time and we killed my pack even before getting to the Lower Haight. It was a relief to get outta there, get on 80 back to Sac.

We didn't say anything on the way back.

That is how I feel right now.

Goodbye homie, writer, intellectual, hero, master debater, eloquent defender of atheism...mentor. Goodbye.