Tie-Dyed Sunday

Another lovely fall day here on the Platinum Coast of California. Across the street in front of the County Bowl, followers of the band Furthur – an offshoot of the Grateful Dead – are gathering for tonight’s show, eight hours early, clad in tie-dye shirts, baggy jeans, sandals and straw hats or knit caps. Some have backpacks, a few, guitars, many have dogs. All these early comers appear as if they have recently come off the road.

Before long, rickety campers and pick-ups pulling pop-up trailers cruise past the Bowl, searching for a place to park. When I take my garbage can out I notice that several vehicles have out of state plates or license plate frames from distant parts of California. One older guy with a long gray beard pulls a small trailer with a yellow VW. Two small dogs sit patiently in the front seat.

Phil Lesh played the Bowl several years ago, and it was the rowdiest, messiest crowd I’d ever seen for a show; that time the faithful came a full two days early and squatted on Anapamu Street. They littered, defecated, urinated, cooked meals on hibachi grills, and annoyed the locals to no end; it was as if a wave of refugees had descended on our edge of town. I remember walking along the street the day after, amazed by all the abandoned pots and pans.

Being a late Baby Boomer I’m too young to remember the Dead when they were in their heyday, but I suppose some of the people sprawled on the lawn across the street are the offspring of hippies and Flower Children, the second generation. What is it about the Dead’s music that exerts such a pull from one generation to the next? I should do research, but it’s unlikely I will. Phil Lesh played bass for the Dead, that I know, and Bob Weir and Jerry Garcia were members of the group. Jerry Garcia is dead, and there is no way to know if he is grateful for being so. Tonight, when the show’s over and all these people have decamped, I will forget about them, move on to other concerns.

But for now, sitting on the porch watching the crowd across the street, the people mingling, playing guitar, smoking cigarettes, singing or laughing in the warm sunshine, greeting acquaintances from other shows, this is a nice diversion from my hectic job, the presidential election, the weak economy, rising costs for health insurance, gasoline and college tuition – all my adult worries and preoccupations. Shove them on the back burner and turn the flame down low.

The show will begin in a few hours, the crowd thickens, pockets of people up and down our street; SBPD units arrive on the scene. Someone calls out, “Jerry Garcia’s ghost will appear on stage tonight.”