MEMORIES TIED TO MUSIC (& other hippie stuffs)
in the summer of 19 hundred 95, i was fourteen & faced w/the task of keeping the grass in our yard trimmed like a respectable beard. the chore, a renewable one, was punishment of sorts from my father for quitting league baseball & hockey in favor of skateboarding & free time - an understandable reaction in small town minnesota. anyway. i had headphones. i dug through my parents’ bin of old cassette tapes, eventually settling on a compilation of early jefferson airplane songs.
i have very specific recollections of pushing a dirty red mower across our lawn that summer, edging the volume higher than the motor… probably losing entire realms of my hearing in the process.
matea & i met paul kantner from the jefferson airplane saturday afternoon in north beach & it brought all these memories back from wherever such things sleep. i recognized him as he crossed the street to mail a letter & later we ended up in line at caffe trieste together.
highlights from our conversation:
1. “shhhhhhhhhhhhhhh”
he didn’t seem to get that only nerds like me would recognize him.
2. “we had a lot of fun in those days… we still do”
translation: jefferson airplane took a lot of drugs… maybe still do.
3. “portland’s a great city… a little tame for me, but our first singer lives there”
this “first singer” is none other than grace slick, his longtime lover, collaborator & the mother of his daughter, china (an mtv vj & actress).
4. “there are only three cities… san francisco, vancouver & amsterdam”
please see no. 2.
ps. now 67, paul wore a scarf in the hot california daylite. this man toured europe w/jim morrison, claimed jerry garcia as his spiritual advisor & co-wrote one of my favorite jefferson airplane songs.
