In another life

Today is Jerry Garcia day, in recognition of his birthday.

I was a huge deadhead when I was a kid. I loved the Grateful Dead, and went to two shows while he was alive. The first show, I was 13 and went with my dad. We were sitting in a closed stadium, way up at the top, and all the pot smoke was coming our way. We sat there in the cloud, and eventually even my dad was dancing.

The second time was at Giants stadium in New York. My friend Nathalie and I went with her mom (I think I was 15) and listened intently to the lyrics, even though by then you couldn't understand a damn thing he was saying. The opening act was Bob Dylan, and he was even harder to understand. I didn't realize at the time that that would be the last time I would see him.

I went to a program for gifted kids (I don't know how I got in) in Pennsylvania when I was 14 and again when I was 15. It was a summer program full of arty and nerdy kids. I had a blast, and that's when I first smoked pot (with a counselor in the woods). All of my art was centered around dead bears and Jerry. I even did a portrait of him in chalk.

All I wanted in the world was to buy a Volkswagon bus and follow the dead. I planned that when I was 16 I would drop out of school and follow them for 2 years, and then get my GED. And then Jerry died in August of 1995, when I was 15. I was devastated. I was still in PA, and I heard it on the radio. They had been playing dead songs all day, and I was rocking out with my little AM/FM radio that I carried everywhere. I didn't understand why, until they announced it in the middle of the day. I had to leave class, I was so distraught.

I went to a little field in the middle of campus with two other deadheads and we sat and cried and told stories of concerts and tapes we had collected. I had all the albums, and many show tapes. We supported each other, and smoked a lot of pot.

So happy Jerry day, everybody.