TIME FOLLOWS ME

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE GHOSTS OF HAIGHT-ASHBURY

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

GHOSTS OF HAIGHT-ASHBURY

The Golden Gate Bridge is suspended on long cables across a large bay. I took the city bus across and enjoyed the vista, overlooking San Francisco Bay. I had made my way by ferry the previous day across that very same broad Bay to reach Alcatraz Island. The reason I went was because here I was in San Francisco, and as a kid I had watched the 1962 film, "The Birdman of Alcatraz". Burt Lancaster the lead actor was a guy who could portray incredible emotion. The story is a fictionalized version of the life of an inmate Robert Stroud, known as the "Birdman of Alcatraz" and his life with birds. In spite of the title, much of the action is set at Leavenworth Prison where Stroud was jailed with his birds. When Burt/Stroud is moved to Alcatraz where he doesn't want to go, he's not allowed to keep any pets. I found the story extremely sad and moving.

The seagulls flew close above the ferry where I sat on the upper deck surrounded by tourists with cameras. The birds dropped bird shit on the tourists. I remember one couple got pretty mad, and had to wipe off their previously spotless blue windbreakers. They laughed nervously after that.

I asked the bus driver where I should get off and he let me off at Ashbury Street. I had heard stories that this is where the hippy movement started in the mid 60's. When I was an early teenager, I went into the town library that was a second home for me. I looked up hallucinogenic drugs in the filing index, and then found a book with this black and white picture of a guy sitting at a typewriter, typing naked while his girlfriend was lying on a mattress on the floor. The caption at the bottom of the picture read, the young man had just taken L.S.D. and stayed up all night writing. On this trip I had done my first L.S.D. trip, it's funny what you wish for.

I knew very little history, but wanted to find out what was happening. I walked down the narrow tilted streets. There were some streets made of brick or cobblestones with shops and cafes lining either side. The houses were tall, narrow, brightly coloured affairs, with three floors. They looked like they had once been prosperous, but now had become tenant rentals. Street vendors hawked their wares. All kinds of jewelry and threads were for sale.

There were lots of couples walkin' 'round but for the life of me, I couldn't see any hippies, only the occasional street person who looked as if he had done a couple too many trips. There were some paintings for sale that I thought were good. I wanted to buy something from one of the vendors but couldn't make up my mind. I am so particular about what threads I wear. It had to feel like me, whatever it was. There were some cool Indian gauze shirts with a bit of embroidery on it. I tried a couple on, found one that fit really well, and wore it out of the shop. It reminded me of something Mary Beth would wear and I hoped she would like me wearing it. It was light and fit the weather fine.

I had left my pack in a locker at a Bus Station so I could walk freely. Was a little worried about it, but it would be safe for the day. There were no free concerts in the parks this day. The police cruised by in cars or on horseback and it looked as if this had become a tourist destination just like Alcatraz. What was once the hotspot of the counter culture, the beatniks and the hippies, had now become the restaurant counter culture where ice cream and hip vegetarian restaurants flourished. Where had all the hippies, musicians and artists gone? Where were the children with flowers in their hair? I heard from an older guy who tried to sell me some weed, they had moved to Northern California to start communes in Marin County and up as far as Oregon. Well, maybe that is where I'll head.

I saw so many cool necklaces and bracelets that I couldn't make up my mind what to get. I didn't want to be pressured to buy anything. When someone said that looked good, I tried to check out if they meant it, or whether they were just trying to make a sale. I was looking at these crystals for a while for some reason. They kept attracting me. They were lead crystal on a thin silver necklace. When you held them up, the sunlight shone through them making tiny prisms casting little rainbows all over the place. I wondered if it might be too glittery, but in the end, I bought one. It looked good against my Indian shirt and I could wear it outside or inside my shirt. I liked the feel of it next to the skin on my chest. There's something nice about finding a remembrance of a place. Later, your memory takes you back to that time and place.

I heard some music coming from an alley off of Haight Street. There was the sound of sitars and tablas and the hint of guitars. Followed the sound and traced it to a second story window where someone had a record player. I listened to the end of the song and then there was silence. I think it must have been a record by Ravi Shankar who George Harrison and The Beatles had befriended. The ghosts of the hippies and musicians of Haight-Ashbury were all around me. I just couldn't see them.