4am..you had get there early, The Great Meadow, to sit up front.
There is really no sense, wasn't, if you didn't sit up front. Because thats where we were, the ones that knew how to have two fucking great days in a row with out any any trouble.
We came for the music and the thing.
Waiting in line that morning was some nice lady who had some acid she was willing to share, bless her, while someone else had weird little cups full of jell-o made with vodka and anisette. I came along with the rum and some of Humboldt County's finest.
We had us a time out there in the dark, passing all this shit around, playing harmonicas and guitars and tape recorders.. Some of us knew each other before we met at the fence.
Blues and Jazz festival people are like Deadheads, some are Deadheads.
They travel for shows. San Francisco's own Blues Saint, Tom Mazzolini had as good a party as any other on his shift and lots of us knew it and made it, even if we had to pay to get in.
I had been worried the show wouldn't be any good if it wasn't free in the park anymore, but it was just fine.
The previous evening after finishing up for the day I was resting comfortably under a warm heroin blanket at my partner Alice's pad in the TL.Alice was using me. It was a wonderful arrangement. Then she started telling people I was her old man. This coincided with her decision to smoke coke instead of mixing it up right so indubitably. I had to absent myself from a decidedly detrimental domestic situation.
"The woman I love, I stole her from a friend, now the dirty bitch, she used up all my shit again" was the little ditty, like from "Mercury Blues" playing in my head while I was walking down Market Street to Van Ness. On the street again.
The fog in San Francisco is great most summer nights. it was exceptional this evening, the kind the buses disappear into and then reappear from, a half a bus at a time
and then go back in.
I had my two tickets to the Showl in my pocket.
But
Iwas out.
I had to cop.
Off Van Ness, I cut down O'Farrell a block and stopped by a very reliable location for that kind of thing.
I got in and walked upstairs, the fucking elevator was always broken, it probably still is.
I gave the secret knock and got in again.
There's Alice, already there. Biggie says "You guys are alright, right?"
"I am," she says.
"Nope" I said and left.
This means I have to go see the Iranian and he doesn't like people coming over late. I call him and explain and he says "Come on by, it's alright, can you pick some coke up for me?"
"Sure," I said.
Now, I have to go score from a guy in The Gulch because it's late and almost everyone is closed.
This guy takes care of the hustlers so he's up with the night crowd, one of which I am now.
"Hey man, whats up? You working now?" he says when I walk up.
" I need an eighth for the Iranian," I say.
"That motherfucker. He owes me so he won't come down here himself," he tells me. "I got nothing for him until he pays up."
Me and my big mouth.
I explain the situation I find myself in. He's sympathetic and adamant. Fuck the Iranian.
This really sucks. I have to cop, I'm in the street after midnight which makes me hot, automatically. Now it looks like I have to go down to Valencia Gardens or cop Mexican garbage on 16th street from the shoe polish dog shit guys..
I'm thinking about getting a cab.
I called the Iranian and explained what happened because of my big mouth.
He told me to come on up anyway, he had plenty he just wanted insurance.
But maybe I could pay off his thing, maybe get him some more, would I mind?
"How much?"
"Four hundred. I'll give it right back"
"Shit. Alright, I'll be along."
"Hey, get some wine too will you."
See, with guys like us it's give an inch and lose a mile, but I have to cop.
Anyway, it happened just the way it would have if I believed in God and asked for assistance and got it. I paid off his thing and got him his request. I rented his extra room. We did some Persian he had that was outstanding, and cut it up smoking coke and drinking wine until I got a cab down to Fort Mason and made the Blues Festival line by four a.m.
I never gave a thought to why I cut Alice off, for smoking coke.
That was the past already, we did it a hour at a time then.
Those people and I were old school.
There isn't much of it left, the old school.
We operated on a different plane than most of the rest of the world.
We had a code, rules.
I'm the only one from that night still alive.
I don't go down there anymore.
The old neighborhood is full of dime dancer crack heads and punks, snitches and weasels now so I don't fit in.
It's dangerous, too.
I don't like danger
Probably because I got old
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