71 Your time is not your own

We couldn't sleep all day. Had to get out of the campground eventually and Tommy and Crystal were on their way to do some family thing. I definitely remember the guys were up the earliest. It was the first time LBJ had anything to do with making a campfire. City people in the wild. No big production. Coffee. Maybe we had granola.

Crystal showed me a book she was reading. Lord of the Rings. The crowd I was coming from liked heavy stuff, music and reading. Some people were basically criminal element. I was into the supernatural and that started at a very young age. I talked to the fairies when I was a kid. But at the time, copies of Lord of the Rings weren't making the rounds. I had my own mind, but I was just never exposed to it before this. I guess the symbolism in it is pretty heavy. She said "You have to read this!" You may throw down whatever's in your hand in disbelief, but I still haven't read it Crystal. Sorry. A lot of stuff happened and I just didn't.

With all our talking we figured San Francisco would be a good place to end up. That was our hosts destination anyway. On the road. Dreams of hanging with other free thinking people. Taking in all the experience. Maybe it will be a whole new thing?

Tommy just driving away. We pretty much kept our heads that day. One thing I was surprised to see on the way in were the hills with brown grass. I understand that kind of climate now, but that was something I hadn't seen before. When places had grass it was green till fall. It was new to me that rain and moisture was so seasonal. Strange looking stuff.

"Hey, we're going to Fisherman's Wharf. It's great!" Ok. It's not like we had any expectations or plans. You could smell the sea air. Gulls were flying. I hear it's a heck of a lot different now. No big deal to park that van right near the wharf. They bought some shrimp with cocktail sauce and loaves of sourdough bread. We obviously grew up by the ocean, but the harvests were different. We went to Pete's Clam Bar. I loved the scallops there, but no thanks to the clams on the half shell for me. Clams were a big deal to my family. They got barrels of them for get togethers, so fresh they spit. Family friends fished the North Atlantic for halibut. Good stuff. But as far as shrimp went all we ever had were those special little glasses of Sau-Sea Shrimp Cocktail. Dumped on some iceberg lettuce.

The food was so delicious. Fresh salt air. I said "I can't wait to take a trolley!" All those Rice-A-Roni ads had an impact on me. Oh no. In 1972 they were going through some big repair stage. Not this year. Oh well. I wasn't there to be a tourist anyway.

Tommy said "We have to go now." Crystal was almost broken up about it. Who knows, maybe their time alone wasn't always so fun. She gave us a number and as a matter of fact, Norm in Chicago gave us his number too. Had it for a number of years but life was going by fast and I moved so many times, everything got lost along the way. 

We all waved and they took off. Standing there on the docks. I wasn't afraid. Where are we going? Let's just start walking.

70 All your friends are there

We jumped in the van. I remember it pretty well because it was in such good condition. The hippie crowd that we knew weren't all that big on shiny, clean vehicles. I guess it was pretty new at the time. It was tan and only had seats in the front. The rest of the van was for sleeping and camping stuff. So we plopped down in the back.

Pretty close to this

I was able to look directly at the gal and she was in the passenger seat, so I must have been right behind the dude. They were friendly as heck. They asked us our story. We told them about dreaming of getting to California. The trees, the mountains and the fresh air. Trying to live away the filth and oppressive darkness of the city. The motivating incident was never shared. We didn't want to think about it, let alone bring down everyone else.

They were from somewhere in LA. When we heard that it blew us over. L-A. 

We were a happy go lucky little group. Even though we had completely different experiences the laughter didn't stop. I don't know how Tommy Chong could drive. Passed a joint around a couple of times. I don't remember if I talked about the difference between pot then and now. It was more mellow for sure, but yes paranoia sometimes set in. I'm no expert but monster strains didn't happen yet. You just added hash or whatever if you wanted more.

Bouncing along Highway 395. Another situation sitting on the floor, and not seats, we missed some of the scenery. Caught a portion of it, but we were pretty busy talking and laughing. We did have discussions about the beauty of the scenery and good places to go in California. It was on the eastern side of the Sierras and we made our way past some pretty spectacular areas.

Whitney near Lone Pine

Death Valley to the right, Yosemite on the left. I think we went to heaven that day. 

"Do you like Taco Bell?" "Taco Bell? What's that? What's a taco?" "Huh? You've never had a taco?" No. This is 1972. I'm from Long Island. Listen to my accent. We had newspapers and the six o'clock news. I'm supposing the sophisticated members of New York society that were well traveled knew what they were talking about. We had pizza, heroes and knishes. Maybe there were a few places we didn't know about that had tacos. The world was regional.

I honestly don't remember where this Taco Bell was. Maybe it was South Lake Tahoe. Wherever it was, Crystal was delighted to introduce us to our first Mexican food. She was so happy. We were so happy. Tommy was tired from smoking and driving. I was in a wonderland. LBJ was along for the ride.

Not the one we went to

Everything was so good. It was what I needed. Clean my soul out. What a day. Headed to go camp. Was it dusk by the time we pulled into the entrance to the campground? Old fella in the booth. He could see us in the back. "Are you married?" he said to us. Before I could blurt out my holy Catholic honesty, LBJ answered yes. He looked at Tommy and Crystal and asked them too. "Yes" they said. "Alright. We don't let unmarried couples in here." That was still going on big time in a lot of places. 

Started driving on down the road, Crystal turned and asked "Are you guys really married?" No. "Oh. Either are we. It was good you said that." I don't know why the guy believed us. If you saw the four of us on the street in those days you wouldn't think we were following any kind of the rules. I suppose the man in the booth didn't really give a crap. Just had to ask. Some of those old timers lived kind of hard lifestyles themselves.

Photo credit Gregory Haynes

The spot we were at was pretty isolated. I don't think anyone was close. The air. The clean air. The pines. The sound of nothing. Except deep observations on the stars. Maybe sometime I'll do a special edition trying to recreate some of those conversations.

There was no tent. They usually slept in the van. We were just gonna throw our sleeping bags on the ground but Crystal would have nothing to do with it. We were all going to fit in the back of the van. Rolled out those bags. I had the stinky mummy bag first. It was us two girls in the middle, fellas on the outside. Still laughing. Wow. That sleeping bag smells. Ok. LBJ, you're taking it tonight. Keep it away from our hosts as much as possible. There was no squishing. No snoring. Just silent, happy peace when we finally stopped laughing. We were God's creatures that night. The way it was always meant to be. So lucky.

Photo credit Amy Bennett

69 It was a change in direction

Kingman, barstow, san bernandino.
Won't you get hip to this timely tip
When you make that california trip
Get your kicks on route sixty-six.

A few I think, but that was back in Winslow. Now we were looking for a ride again in Kingman. I don't remember the driver or the ride but somehow we made it to Needles. This time when they would have asked "Where are you headed?" we'd answer "California" and they would have said "Yeah. Heading right there."

Then Route 66

Made it. I remember it being kind of a place you could have your privacy. Didn't see too much of the town but it didn't look fancy at all. Do what you want. Older buildings. Out in the middle of nowhere. I thought it might be kind of a cool place to live. But that was from looking at a distance. We kept moving.

About 1980

New photo

It wasn't all that easy yet. We got a ride out of Needles pretty quick but we were left in a desolate place again. Looking at the map now my guess would be Fenner, but I can't be sure. I just remember looking around and saying "This is the Mojave?"

Fortunate though. It may have been an hour or less but not long enough to ponder mortality. Just enough to appreciate wide open spaces. Got the ride we needed, timing was perfect. It all fell into place after this. Dropped off near Barstow. I said "Hey! That's where Big Valley took place!" "No. That's Stockton." Cool.

I suppose we were past Barstow, near Highway 395. It's a VW van pulling over. "Where are you going?" "Oh. We're not really sure." "We're going up to Lake Tahoe. You wanna come with us?" Yes.

She kind of reminded me of Crystal Gayle with plenty of hippie overtones and he reminded me of Tommy Chong when his hair was long. They were to be our guides and guardians our first couple of days in California.

68 Disappearing dreams

I'm not going to try to remember more than I really do. The mind can fill blanks in if you let it, and that stuff is bologna. I know I'm never going to recall more because I definitely remember "Wow. What happened?" at the time. I remember getting in that last pickup truck, the guy saying something about Indian reservations and then walking in an old white house, 30's style, with a wooden screen door opening and slamming. 

Like this house

I think I must have been really out of it from the time with heat, sun and blisters. My thought is this guy was pretty cool and let us "crash" for a bit. It wasn't long. Maybe one or two days. I think I really changed even more over those few days. I looked at everything differently. I'm pretty sure I saw how good it could be. I knew it already, but there were people living relaxed. Old houses, dirty wooden floors and relaxing. Not the eternal road to nowhere. But choose what you want. That's the way.

The next thing I remember is standing in Winslow. I kind of hate saying that because of that song. That's just another commercial venture now. Wasn't there long in town but I do remember looking around and loving the people. Maybe it just stood out to me, but there were a lot of long hairs. Overalls, no shirt. You could tell they did some manual labor. You know the look. Driving in pickups. I didn't notice any chicks, just guys. It was sunny and bright, but I wasn't dying. I was pretty darn happy. 

Still kind of out of it so the next ride is a blur too. Maybe it was another semi because I don't remember looking out the window at all unfortunately. It was Route 66 back then. I guess it's Highway 40 now. Why did they mess that all up? 

The next thing I remember was being in Kingman, Arizona. Another cool turquoise looking town. So different than back east. The buildings were brighter. Different colors. Blues. White. I've said this before, my pupils got bigger.

We didn't have to wait too long for a ride but this was a first. A straight looking middle aged couple pulled over. Your perception of age is a little whacked when you're younger, they were probably mid-40's. Went running up there, the wife was in the passenger seat of course. She had a pained look on her face, wasn't real happy. The dude had this jerk look. I'm going to compare him to the asshole husband in Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore. I kind of hesitated to get in, but they pulled over.

They didn't go too far, I was feeling uncomfortable anyway. I could sense some tension between the two. More than sensing, it was obvious. The husband said they were stopping at a diner. He'd pay. Ok, free food.

We're eating a nice big breakfast. The works. But the pain this poor woman was suffering. She stayed mute. Just sad looks. Practically crying. Not anything angry, just downcast. This fella kept looking at me. No consideration for his wife. Asking me strange questions. It wasn't the "looking," it was the obvious way he enjoyed making his wife feel meaningless. LBJ didn't really notice. He was hungry and eating. I had a little bit of a soul and didn't like to see intentional cruelty.

Here I go again. This guy was a complete asshole. I don't care what goes on in people's bedrooms or whatever, but I'm not into public humiliation. My blood boiled. I stood up and yelled at him. "You're an asshole. Why are you so mean to your wife?" Whatever is going on now, back then many women were just expected to take what they got. I know people in the restaurant looked. The wife finally put her head up. LBJ was thinking, oh no... I just want to finish my food. I grabbed my bags and walked out. I really, really hope that sparked a little something in her. I sure hope it didn't cause any trouble. But sometimes you just can't help speaking.