Not Yuma
Me and this guy Billy hitchhiked from Austin to Telluride for the Jazz Festival in August of 79. We had both attended summer school at the University hoping to shorten the amount of years actually spent in classrooms. It was a few months later that it came to me there was a better way to go about this but at the time I was only considering the way which had been laid out for me.
Telluride, Colorado, which is off the beaten track, and even then was being overrun by capitalistic hippies, was a destination well worth the effort getting there (The Tall Texan smoked Merits and issued many a "comeback" on that CB radio), and as if to underscore that we had arrived in a place different from what we knew Billy and I immediately found ourselves beckoned into the living room of a lovely and earthly young woman who hoped we could assist in her time of need, but for me it was more like a self guided tour, Billy behind or in front, who can remember?, but neither one of us were able to change the fact that the naked man in the bathtub was having a seizure, so we just noted whatever it was we each noted, and moved on, until we found ourselves outside, and back in motion, the smell of patchouli a sensory reference point.
Pat Metheney may have been the musical highlight, and I'm not clear who was on the afternoon blues stage but I'm thinking it was John Lee Hooker and/or Lightnin' Hopkins.
The trip changed both Billy and I, in ways we may ponder at length, and come early December he was talking about dropping out of school. I encouraged him to stay the course because it seemed like the thing to do, but I was restless too, and after a week in Dallas for Christmas break I lied to my parents saying I had a job to get back to in Austin. I then hitchhiked to Los Angeles and visited friend Mark Fitzpatrick on the USC campus. On the first night in town, or on the way out, I slept in the Rose Garden next to the Coliseum under a bed of yellow roses which I dedicated to my unrequited love. Must have been the way out because I was alone and I'm remembering now that I met a French Canadian raised in Georgia by the name of Rodney Gimberling on 290 West just outside of Austin after he had stolen some snacks from that roadside store, and we had made the trip west together. Some months later, back in Texas, Rodney would come back to haunt me and I would spend my first night in jail, for trying to beat a cab fare, in Dallas, which would then a couple of years later be the second to last jail I visited before becoming good, and honest, and wholesome, like I am now.
I think Rodney headed for San Francisco while I headed back to Texas to start my fifth semester at the University. It's hard to hitchhike out of Los Angeles. I have so far never been harmed by another in my travels but I can't help but remember the candor of what I consider the representative Los Angelian in regards to hitchhiking--after waiting four hours in one spot for a ride and a car stops and I get in and the driver accelerates onto the highway while casually inquiring "do you mind if I jack you off while I drive?" Under reacting to such a situation is a safe way to go and so a reponse like "you can let me off at the next exit" was all the defense I ever needed. I've told this story a hundred times and it bores me now to rewrite it, but I keep hoping there's some gratifying truth I can make use of by the remembering, the recounting, the recitation of it all. I have to move on now, this here as good a place as any, although I thought I'd stick it out tonight until I memoired the Yuma to San Antonio leg of this trip, but I''ve been wrong before and the experience of being wrong is maybe as good as a person gets.
|
Me and this guy Billy hitchhiked from Austin to Telluride for the Jazz Festival in August of 79. We had both attended summer school at the University hoping to shorten the amount of years actually spent in classrooms. It was a few months later that it came to me there was a better way to go about this but at the time I was only considering the way which had been laid out for me.
Telluride, Colorado, which is off the beaten track, and even then was being overrun by capitalistic hippies, was a destination well worth the effort getting there (The Tall Texan smoked Merits and issued many a "comeback" on that CB radio), and as if to underscore that we had arrived in a place different from what we knew Billy and I immediately found ourselves beckoned into the living room of a lovely and earthly young woman who hoped we could assist in her time of need, but for me it was more like a self guided tour, Billy behind or in front, who can remember?, but neither one of us were able to change the fact that the naked man in the bathtub was having a seizure, so we just noted whatever it was we each noted, and moved on, until we found ourselves outside, and back in motion, the smell of patchouli a sensory reference point.
Pat Metheney may have been the musical highlight, and I'm not clear who was on the afternoon blues stage but I'm thinking it was John Lee Hooker and/or Lightnin' Hopkins.
The trip changed both Billy and I, in ways we may ponder at length, and come early December he was talking about dropping out of school. I encouraged him to stay the course because it seemed like the thing to do, but I was restless too, and after a week in Dallas for Christmas break I lied to my parents saying I had a job to get back to in Austin. I then hitchhiked to Los Angeles and visited friend Mark Fitzpatrick on the USC campus. On the first night in town, or on the way out, I slept in the Rose Garden next to the Coliseum under a bed of yellow roses which I dedicated to my unrequited love. Must have been the way out because I was alone and I'm remembering now that I met a French Canadian raised in Georgia by the name of Rodney Gimberling on 290 West just outside of Austin after he had stolen some snacks from that roadside store, and we had made the trip west together. Some months later, back in Texas, Rodney would come back to haunt me and I would spend my first night in jail, for trying to beat a cab fare, in Dallas, which would then a couple of years later be the second to last jail I visited before becoming good, and honest, and wholesome, like I am now.
I think Rodney headed for San Francisco while I headed back to Texas to start my fifth semester at the University. It's hard to hitchhike out of Los Angeles. I have so far never been harmed by another in my travels but I can't help but remember the candor of what I consider the representative Los Angelian in regards to hitchhiking--after waiting four hours in one spot for a ride and a car stops and I get in and the driver accelerates onto the highway while casually inquiring "do you mind if I jack you off while I drive?" Under reacting to such a situation is a safe way to go and so a reponse like "you can let me off at the next exit" was all the defense I ever needed. I've told this story a hundred times and it bores me now to rewrite it, but I keep hoping there's some gratifying truth I can make use of by the remembering, the recounting, the recitation of it all. I have to move on now, this here as good a place as any, although I thought I'd stick it out tonight until I memoired the Yuma to San Antonio leg of this trip, but I''ve been wrong before and the experience of being wrong is maybe as good as a person gets.
- jimlouis 3-05-2001 1:54 am