The
LSD vibe comes easy to me now, that
chill up my spine and the expansion of my
pupils. Maybe it’s just my ears burning, as
Bubbie used to say, “When your ears are burning that means someone is talking about you.” I haven’t heard her voice in some
13 odd years.
I stopped going out during the day. I would stay inside the basement and sleep until it was as dark outside as it was inside. I would get up then and go out for a burrito or maybe to Myopic for a coffee. It was winter, it was dark a lot of the time and I kept long hours smoking lots of grass.
One night I went into a bar because it was the Grateful Dead night. I met this guy there and he offered me a job in his silk screening shop. I needed money to get out of town. I had been back only a short time but I already sensed it was time to go. Winter was coming.
I walked from the townhouse across a cold field in February and listened to Led Zeppelin on my Walkman. I walked to the library and got comfortable and found a good science fiction book to read. I read for the next four hours or so before I found the courage to go home.
The concert let out and people looking for a cold beer to drink swarmed me. I pocketed a quick 50 and walked back to the van with an empty cooler. Mike was selling beer out in front of the parked Westfalia. I took a beer out and asked him if he got into the show.
I put my thumb out and hitchhiked out of Albany. The first ride took me down the road about 10 miles. The second took me another 40 and left me their phone number. The third was the police taking me off the interstate. They left me there on an onramp in the rain.
I sat down in the lecture hall. There were 50 other people in there with me, from the looks of it all of them were 18 or 19. I felt old suddenly and out of place. The professor walked in late and introduced the course to us. I read the syllabus and read some Star Wars comics.
Sitting in the police car in the dark, alone in handcuffs, tired from the long day, unsure of what was coming next I appreciated the quiet and solitude and closed my eyes. The officer came back an hour later with his other catch. He put him in the car next to me, and we drove off.