How you managed to get through this life in one piece is a mystery – even you can’t figure it out. You were there – you should know – blank wall.
Friday night – The Hullabaloo on Sunset – Moby Grape – sold out – people everywhere. Sunset Strip was mobbed as always.
The four of you crammed into your buddy’s Corvair. Spent an hour looking for a parking space – managed to find one six blocks away, right behind the CBS building. Car reeked of dope. You all stagger out and do a slow motion slog down to Sunset.
Four guys – no dates. Always on the lookout – you’ve given up, for now anyway.
The Hullabaloo is crowded – one solid mass of people, hanging out in front of the entrance and spilling out on to Sunset – clouds of smoke and some of it ain’t Marlboros. You hand in your ticket and slip inside.
The Leaves are finishing their set and disappear as the stage slowly revolves like a giant turntable, waiting for the next record.
You make your way through a sea of people, pressing against each other for a better view of the stage. You stake out a ten inch patch of floor and wait for the show to start. Your friends are somewhere – you lost them near the concession stand. The air is clogged with cigarettes and everybody seems to be bumming matches and extras – you’ve already given away half your pack. You don’t mind – it’s easy to make friends when you bum a cigarette from somebody. You gaze around the crowd. So many women you could make promises to – all taken or looking through you like frosted glass. You’re too much looking forward to seeing Moby Grape than to get depressed over your drab, empty life anyway.
Lights dim. The Band takes the stage and it all becomes louder than god, just like everyone said. “Listen My Friends” and your lungs are rattling around your ribcage – your buzz is in high gear – life is perfect.
And just then a hand grabs your arm and a female voice yells “Let’s DANCE!!”
You spin around and come face to face with a girl you swear you knew from another life – even in the dark her smile radiates and her eyes glue to yours.
You can’t dance to save your life but at least you have rhythm. You don’t even know what you call what you’re doing but she’s into it and soon you’re bouncing all over the floor and jumping into thin air.
You have come to the conclusion you are soulmates and the rest of the night you are inseparable.
You clutch each other like there’s a life raft involved and her hands leave you speechless. You could swear and stake your life on the fact you have never been kissed by anyone like her before. They just don’t make tongues like that anywhere on Earth.
If you suddenly dropped dead your life would be complete – no need to go any further – it will never be better than this. You see endless futures with her and you don’t even know your her name.
Your friends finally manage to locate you, but one look at the two-person love-in taking place in the middle of the dance floor and they quietly step back and let the music take over.
When you’re in the midst of dying of boredom life has a habit of slowing to a crawl, as if to savor your irritation by making you bask in it. When you are wildly out of your mind in love, lust and optimism, life just turbo-charges on to the next patch of boredom as a way of letting you know who is in charge.
In a matter of what seemed like seconds, Moby Grape finished their set and revolved off into space. The house lights came back on and you are locked, intertwined, glued together like airplane parts.
Your friends, who are quietly waiting outside for you to make an appearance eye you with a combination of envy and perplexity. The Police are doing on a Saturday night what they always do on a Saturday night; look for drunks, dope addicts and teenagers; it was curfew after all.
It was hard, cramming your life story into the space of thirty seconds while you kept holding her hands and falling head-first into her eyes. For her part, she grabbed a matchbook cover and scribbled her phone number and mentioned something about Woodland Hills.
It was a sign – this was serious. This was the start of something. You finally found love and it hit you when you weren’t looking. They say life happens by accident – you were up to your ears in living proof.
You found a slip of paper and scribbled your number down, promising each other you would call and make plans.
And you had plans – you had nothing but plans.
Next morning you hovered over the phone – you didn’t sleep all night, but making a call at 6 am didn’t seem like a good idea.
So you waited until 7. You had all night to build up a profuse, drenching sweat along with a gyrating stomach and your hands were shaking when you finally dialed the phone.
After six rings an annoyed male voice answered. You froze – hung up and checked the humber. Nerves and being clumsy.
You dialed again – rang six times again – same annoyed guy, now getting pissed off. Now it was his turn – he yelled “Wrong Number!” and hung up.
Okay – mildly freaking out but determined. You dial again – this time slowly; repeating each number out loud as you dialed it. No mistakes this time.
Same guy – now ready to reach through the phone and strangle you. You ask if it’s the right number. It’s the right number, but there’s nobody there by that name.
You could feel little parts of you breaking apart and cascading to the floor around your feet.
You started wracking your brain – you remember she said Woodland Hills. Oh great – three high schools in Woodland Hills – and she didn’t tell you which one.
You decide to hang out at each one and try to find her.
It didn’t occur to you to consider the potential impossibility of it, but you were determined. This was the love of your life – you were determined to go to any lengths. This was, after all, the future.
Eventually you located her – by accident. Last school on the list – got there at passing period and saw her walk out of a classroom, carrying a stack of books.
Heart racing and nerves doing backflips you ran up and prepared to wrap your arms around her and pick up where you left off a week earlier.
She looked at you like Atomic waste, didn’t say a word and kept walking.
Stunned, mortified and perplexed you ran down the hallway after her, trying to catch up – trying to get some answer.
She turned and walked into her next class – and that’s where “the other guy” came in.
Oh. She had a boyfriend – Oh. She wasn’t serious – Oh. He was on the Wrestling Team. He had Jock written all over him. She didn’t acknowledge your presence on the planet – he was giving you stink eye. You took the hint.
Your last fifty cents on gas and a pledge you and The San Fernando Valley were no longer on speaking terms.
Crushed, demoralized and feeling hopeless. The best you could do was stand in front of your bathroom mirror and yell at yourself. Even your parents felt sorry for you, and that said a lot.
You’re through less than a quarter of your life – you can hardly wait for the rest of it.
But there’s always Moby Grape to help sort it out.
Along with 20 minutes worth of Dave Diamond and his first night on KFWB from June 27, 1967.
