Not Fade Away

I was 16 years old when I saw my first Dead show, maybe 15. It was either 1989 or ‘90, or maybe time doesn’t exist at all? 

I’m not sure if that McNichnols show was the one that changed my life, but I do know it brought me back. And by the time I came back, I was ready for acid. And that first acid show definitely changed everything. Well, that series of three acid shows really: in Bonner Springs, Kansas; outside in the parking lot the next night; then back home in Denver a few days later, at Mile High Stadium. How appropriate.

I realize there is no way to tell my Grateful Dead story without getting deeply personal. That’s the nature of my relation to this music… it’s inside me now. And I believe I’m better for it. Am I the most motivated or successful person? No way. And I may be a borderline hedonist and 100% absurdist, but I don’t think anyone has very much bad to say about me? Which is a pretty good starting point for goodness, i think.

Anyways, Bobby died on Saturday, at 78, and he was full of goodness. That I know. 

I think I was still expecting to see him again before he died. So that hurt even more than just losing an artist who means so much to me. It was an irrational expectation, of course, as I haven’t seen any iterations of the Dead for many years, unlike so many new fans climbing on the VW microbus every day (there’s plenty of room, hop on!). 

I saw a couple of those early post-Jerry shows, and it never really drew me back for some reason. I think it made me really miss Jerry, to whom I became spiritually devoted when he beatifically saved me from the satanic shadows enveloping Mile High after that double-dose kicked in savagely. Ever since, he was kind of more real to me than God. 

And the guy gloriously singing praises and strumming far out chords alongside him seemed great, Daisy Dukes and all, but perhaps he was more of an angel.

Did I ascribe to the narrative Bobby was somehow the butt of a joke, probably not, though the Bobby talk was loud and I was easily influenced back then. But I think it just enforced my feeling that Jerry was the real power source. What I didn’t get till much later, though, and this is why I still thought I’d see Bobby and give him his proper due, was that when Jerry died, he had filled a lot of batteries with his power, and none filled so powerfully as Bobby.

Thanks to Bobby, and the rest of the band who played on, the Grateful Dead Movement is as vitally energetic as it was in 1989… or ’90. Peace and love and fucking grooving finds a way. It’s one of the few movements i don’t fear.

The reason I went back to see the Dead after that first show at Big Mac… it’s not that I was roped immediately, in fact, I basically napped the entire second set, after smoking the entirety of Liza’s parents’ bag of weed (we stole it, and didn’t realize you weren’t supposed to smoke it all at once). When I woke up, the entire arena was visible, house lights blaring upon long closed eyes. Every smiling face swayed, and clapped, and chanted along, “Love is real, not fade away… love is real, not fade away… love is real, not fade away”… and something inside me dreamed they were right.