It was a wonderful year, it was a horrible year. Maybe ‘69 or ‘70.
I was teaching in a junior college in Wharton, Texas, where Spanish moss hung from the magnolia trees and a Civil War-era tombstone in the local cemetery read “Our black mamy” [sic]. My wife and I had just separated, after sex with friends showed us we were too young and stupid to make it together. Because I had a mustache and had moved there from Austin, the local police routinely opened my mail. A sheriff’s deputy sat in a squad car several nights a week to spy at my windows with binoculars.
On weekends I fled to Austin in my souped-up VW bus to hang out with friends, smoke dope, and play music. It was too dangerous to keep weed at home, though I buried a coffee can full in the neighbor’s back yard for a while. For these weekend escapes, I planted my stash under a bush by the side of the road in the middle of nowhere about 20 miles from town, on a rarely-used back road I took to make time. When I came back in the wee hours of the morning, I’d find the spot, stop, and re-bury the can. A hell of a way to live.
One winter weekend I finally scored with a very strange girl who didn’t know I was there. It was like sex with a mannequin, only the rest of the time, she’d hint at the moon. I was apparently the only one in Austin not getting blown in the U.T. Library stacks, and man, was I pissed. But she wanted to go hear some music, and the Magic Band was in town. Captain Beefheart was one of my heros, and I could hardly believe he was right there at the ‘Dillo.
During cold weather, bands played on the small stage at the south end of the building, while the rest of the space was curtained off to conserve heat. This was just fine with me, since we got to sit closer, and when the Beefheart experience exploded on Saturday night, it was bloody intense. I’ve probably never heard such astonishing, indescribable sounds, like listening to God, Miles, and Jimi on the road to Damascus. There were only about 30 people on folding metal chairs, and after a minute we all stood for the duration. The show was more than I could ever hope to be part of again, even if I lived to be a hundred. A life-altering detail was that the Captain had added a second gig and would play again Sunday. I had to teach Monday morning, but what about Beefheart? Trouble ahead, for sure.
I stayed in town for the Sunday night show. I had to, and besides, I was angling for soft hands in my underwear. They didn’t make an appearance, but Beefheart sure did, and if anything came on much stronger the second night. There were fewer people in attendance for the under-publicized show, and I stood right up in front. By the time the last chord faded away and the band disappeared, it was 2:00 a.m., with me facing several hours of drive time. It was so late and I was so rushed, I didn’t hide the stash but just roared home to Wharton, danger be damned.
No way would I make it to class. Before hitting the sack, I set the alarm so I’d wake up at 8:00 long enough to call a student assistant and tell her to put a “Class Canceled” sign on the door to my classroom. This was too easy by far, and the beginning of the end.
Over the next year I perfected the college instructor’s (occasional) three-day work week, leaving on Thursday and coming back Monday. Nixon was bombing Cambodia, and the known world was going to hell. The girl moved away, but I still jammed with my friends and made plans to buy land in the Ozarks. The Spanish moss still hung in the magnolia trees on the Texas Gulf coast, and I acquired a dog. At the end of May ‘71, the two of us left Wharton in the VW bus with a 50-pound bag of brown rice, two guitars, and a book by a yogi called “How to Know God.” The next stop was northwest Arkansas and a whole new kind of lonesome, with bare boobs in the sunshine and no sex at all.
Life is not to be missed. Don’t do just like me, but give it a shot!
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