Flower Child
When I ran away to San Francisco in the 70's I
had the opportunity to meet some really colorful people. 'Jimbo' was a colleague
of my boyfriend and they both worked in the financial district in the City.
Jimbo was a kind and gentle soul; a deep thinker who said very little. He was
an easy, peaceful house guest who could smoke dope much longer than anyone else
in the room. He was a good son; he was a great friend; a man who never
complained in spite of a kidney transplant and other assorted health problems.
Jimbo died quite unexpectedly last week, and
I can only hope his family was there by his side at the end. He was part of my
life back in the 70's when I was fresh faced; naive; and madly in love with an
older man. We three would party hard and wake up to do it all over again. He
shared our space with us; he shared our dope with us; we had some good and
high times at 724 Haight Avenue. Haight, as in, Haight Ashbury.
As a dedication to Jimbo, I have posted an excerpt from my book. I know that he'll be pleased to know that someone was
taking notes and writing it down.
***Chapter III - March 21, 1972***
Our four-room slum apartment has one
window, no couch, and a hand-me-down Samsonite card table for eating. There is
incense, candles, posters on the wall, and a black light in the bathroom for
the day-glow paint on the footed tub. There are street drugs and plenty of
suspicious characters walking around the neighborhood. Some wear platform
shoes, flowing capes, and flash rolls of cash on our street corner.
There are cockroaches in our
apartment. I fill bowls of sugar and put them in the cupboards for these monsters.
At least I know where to look for them each morning. The trash guys won’t come
into our yard as we have two Dobermans, a German shepherd, and a basset hound.
We sell mescaline in the city for
our rent. There is little food in the house and we eat mostly potatoes. Our
neighbors, Jack and Liz, give us a fryer
chicken. A shower curtain divides their kitchen from the living room, and Liz
wears hot pants while she cooks. They are good people and poor like us. They
don’t mind dirty hippies.
I take LSD and the Dobermans turn
into new wet colts. The surrounding Victorian apartments look 3-D and I’m frantic I’ll
never be straight again. We keep the windowpane acid in the refrigerator. I’ve
gained 15 pounds on potatoes and munchies, and William won’t take me anywhere
when I’m stoned because he said I’m a huge bust. I’ll go on an ice cream diet
to lose this bubble butt. I’m 5’8” and 133 pounds.
I have a birthday party for William and there are lots of drugs in the house. We take plastic bread
wrappers, tie them together like a rope, and hang them from the ceiling. After
I place a bucket of water under the rope, we set the plastic on fire. It lights
up pretty fast and the sparks fall into the water. The colors and sounds are
amazing! We live in an old house and have no fire extinguishers. If
the ceiling catches fire, we’ll grab our drugs and the pets. We
play dominoes, lie in the hall, and stare at black light posters. I’m tired and
miss my parents. The cockroaches eat better than I do.