Aftermath: Goin' Home from Woodstock 40 Years Ago
My high school buddy Kenny is at the wheel of his big-ass Galaxie 500. I and another friend named Kester are manning the eight-track up front while the two young women who had chastely accompanied us on the trip from Buffalo to Bethel sit primly in the back seat. The Galaxie has a big V-8 and Kenny likes to move. We were, as the song says, goin’ home.
Suddenly, a flashing cherrytop in the rearview.
A siren.
A speed trap.
A heart attack.
Kenny’s pissed. He'd have been been more than that -- probably paralyzed -- if he knew, as I do, that Kester’s holding a lid of grass. Neither of us feel the need to confess the news to Kenny as he pulls the big blue car onto the highway's shoulder.
Historical note: People did serious prison time in 1969 for possession of grass. And not just the people who were holding.
A state trooper exits his vehicle and ambles over to Kenny’s window. He tells Kenny he’s been doing 90 in a 60. The trooper takes Kenny’s license, sticks his head in the window, and casts his steely gaze across us mud-spattered refugees.
The air is redolent of cow.
Historical note: Cops and kids frequently didn't see eye-to-eye in the '60s, let alone nose-to-nose.
Kenny, Eileen and I are three about-to-be college sophomores, still as straight-looking as our high school graduation portraits. Babe, the sister of a friend, is in high school and looks even more innocent, if not straighter. Kester, the only guy we kow with long hair, looks a bit like Alvin Lee, the guitarist for 10 Years After, the British blues band he adores that had torn up the crowd on Saturday night.
I’m still buzzing with a weekend-derived love for all humanity but fearful I'll have to spend all those good vibes in the state pen. The cop's silence is killing me.
I can't help it. I've got to say something that expresses the blissful way I feel and that will somehow ingratiate the trooper into letting us off the hook that he is so obviously preparing for us.
“You guys did a great job back at the festival, officer.”
The trooper freezes and stares at me. He says nothing. Kenny looks ready to throttle me.
The trooper ambles back to his cruiser and takes a very long time running Kenny’s plate. A very long time. When he finally returns, he bends over and peers in at us again. Stands back up. Rips a ticket from his book. Tells Kenny how to fill it out if he chooses to plead guilty. Otherwise, Kenny has a night court date in East Jesus, N.Y. in about a month.
Then he was gone. No questions. No pat-downs. No arrests. Without so much as a “Hi Yo, Silver,” the most understanding state trooper in all of New York State has patched out in a cloud of dust.
It’s the first day after Woodstock, and already the forces of peace and love have won the day.
Needless to say, there's more to the story but I've about used up my excerpt limit. The Township of East Jesus' judiciary proved immune to the peace-and-love vibe and suspended Kenny's license for three months. We're still best friends. Kester got married and disappeared, but not before swearing he was going to name his firstborn "Neil" after Neil Young, which Kenny & I both thought was a better idea than naming a child "Alvin." Eileen became an airline stewardess and the last I heard about Babe, -- maybe 30 years ago -- she was living in Alaska.
The book -- which includes 49 other essays by people who were there -- is published by AdamsMedia & is available on Amazon. Mention my name and they'll say "Who?"
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Comments
But seriously...that's the best thing you could say to the cop? "Great job at the festival"? Lame...
I cannot tell you how jealous I am that you were at Woodstock! I still remember seeing the movie for the first time at the Covell Theater in Modesto & being stoked! Even watching it now (with cheap wine) takes me back to a far less materialistic & strip-mall free time. A time when rock stars had bad teeth & the proper wardrobe consisted of a beat-up army surplus shirt & jeans that cost jack. Sometimes I feel like one of those ancients rambling about Sinatra & the good old days, but really, I miss the simplicity of 1969.
I love the fact that you all looked "straight" & I love the "air is redolent of cow." I can easily imagine the terror you must have felt seeing that red light. Definitely a different time.
Thanks for this wonderful "tease." I'll put this anthology on my Amazon wish list! (Because that way I'll at least get it for Christmas which is not all that far away...)
Suzie: I have a lot of thoughts on Woodstock, which I'll probably need another post to explore. Reading your comment reminded me that the so-called "youth culture" of the day did in deed have its own way of walking and talking and most especially feeling connected. That, I think, is what young people realized in the wake of Woodstock -- you didn't have to be there to be tantalized and excited about a very amorphous but hopeful future. Thanks for the reminder.
Scanner: Right you are about the size of the crowd. Even Joni Mitchell didn't make it, but it didn't stop her from writing the theme song, eh?
"Designator" -- Seeing your playback posts reminded me to get my story up. Much obliged. Thank God for Michael Wadleigh & his film crew. I had to see the film to see (and hear) many of the acts I'd paid (yes, I paid in advance -- another story) to see. The acts I remember witnessing (and loving) were Creedence, The Who, Country Joe, Santana, Joe Cocker, Sly and of course 10 Years After. Anybody asks me, I tell them Santana -- who I'd never heard of before -- stole the show and all I need do to prove it is refer them to the YouTube "Soul Sacrifice" clip. I still get off on it.
Thanks, everyone.
http://pcofftherails101.blogspot.com/2009/07/some-40-years-ago-woodstock-changed-us.html
The title of the book, TAKING WOODSTOCK, and the movie, also has an interesting backstory. Rudy Shur said the title was the brainchild of Square One’s marketing director, Anthony Pomes.
“We had lots of titles in mind, but Taking Woodstock seemed to fit best based on the story,” Shur noted. “We felt the title meant two things: Taking stock of your life and, in a sense, control of your destiny — and also taking the experience of Woodstock, and what that cultural event meant, with you for the rest of your life.”
“Woodstock was a moment of freedom as well as a coming of age for a new generation in America,” Shur added.
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How the book became a Hollywood movie to be directed by an Academy Award winner is also a story that Shur tells with relish.
“It will sound like a Hollywood myth, but it really happened this way,” he said. “Tiber was scheduled to appear on a West Coast television show to promote the book, and while he was waiting in the green room to go on the show, who should sit down next to him, by pure chance, but Ang Lee.”
It turns out that Lee was also scheduled to appear on that same interview show to promote his latest film, Lust, Caution (色,戒).
“Elliot,” continues Shur, “introduced himself and spent the next hour chatting with him about his book.”
“Well, when Lee went on the show, the host finished the interview by asking Lee where he usually got his ideas from for his movies, and Lee said that he really doesn’t go looking for stories, that they seem to come to him. And with that he turned to Elliot, who was sitting across from him, and gave him a sly wink.”
“Nothing really happened until about five months later, when Lee had finally read the book,” Shur said. “Lee and Schamus felt there was a movie here, and together they went to upstate New York to visit the Yasgur’s Farm site where the Woodstock festival took place. Elliot joined them there at the site, and the project was in the can. The agents finalized the deal, everything was signed, and here we are. It looks like Lee was right: in this case, the next movie project really did just seem to come to him.”
regarding your comment about Santana stealing the show ~ I have a funny little story.
I was 16 and serving ice cream in a nearby Carvel. About a week before the event, this truck pulls up, opens and its filled with long haired people and amplifiers. They are a little lost. We served them and they asked us directions to Woodstock, which we provided. We asked who they were and they said "Santana, from San Franciso." "Great! We'll see you there!"
Aren't you glad we gave them good directions?
Dusty: I've tried to keep the commercial aspect of this post to a minimum because I believe OS doesn't need any self-directed commercial interruption. But I'll say this: the book is a worthy effort, it was edited by an extremely hard-working editor named Susan Reynolds and as far as I can see, it's a good deal. I bought 20 copies myself, but I've got a big family.
Tim: Great story. That's how I remember the band being introduced -- as being from San Francisco. The party sure wouldn't have been the same without them.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SpjNLjBbVd4
I once knew a fellow of the same times who spent a year in a Texas prison over a roach in his ashtray. Those weren't The Days.
Gabby: I'll check out your site, toot sweet. In retrospect, I think if I had brought a tube of toothpaste with me, I would have eaten it. Or passed it around among my soggy companions, long as none of them didn't bogart that tube.
Maria: I'm happy you said that. Everybody else tells me "I knew you were old -- but not THAT old."
Zorg: As popular and acceptable as the festival is now, it was a perfect scandal back then. Your mother's reaction was typical and understandable. The great John Sebastian wrote a sweet song about what was going on called "Younger Generation:" "Why must every generation think their folks are square / and no matter where their heads are they know mom's ain't there." You can check out his stoned-to-the-gills performance of this little gen at
Paul: Paranoia struck deep. Into my pup tent it creeped. That tent was where I repaired to in order to get stoned at Woodstock. But that's another part of the story.
Gabby: I'll check out your site, toot sweet. In retrospect, I think if I had brought a tube of toothpaste with me, I would have eaten it. Or passed it around among my soggy companions, long as none of them didn't bogart that tube.
Maria: I'm happy you said that. Everybody else tells me "I knew you were old -- but not THAT old."
Zorg: As popular and acceptable as the festival is now, it was a perfect scandal back then. Your mother's reaction was typical and understandable. The great John Sebastian wrote a sweet song about what was going on called "Younger Generation:" "Why must every generation think they're folks are square / and no matter where their heads are they know mom's ain't there...." He sang this song at Woodstock, stoned to the gills - check it out on YouTube.
Can't wait to have you back, fella.
A good teaser for the book.... What a thrill to be in that anthology!
A good teaser for the book.... What a thrill to be in that anthology!
Jimmy: Yes! Big-picture stories have their place but I'll always take -- and try to report if I can -- the personal story out of which the reader can make his or her own conclusions or just have some fun. It's like with the Mook.
Jim: I think the bloke is still knocking around. The British Blooze Band tradition will never die!
Trilogy: Your own private Woodstock. I can dig it. Hope your eight-track worked better than Kenny's.
Rated
Jeff: Here's a secret I'm only just realizing: Some of my fondest musical memories are the result of seeing the movie. Yes, I remember a bunch of bands, etc. but with rare exceptions (like Hendrix's Star Spangled Shocker) the particular songs of some of my favorite performers are down the memory hole. I remember their presence in an amorphous way -- for most of the time, the music was background against which I cavorted, wandered or just sat. For most of the show, I was a million miles away, physically and psychically. Even though the forces of corporate America initially missed the boat, Warner Bros. still was an important component of the event.
Love the historical in0line footnotes. Love this:
"big-ass Galaxie 500"
yep. they were.
And i so remember those dread fears of police and their power to send us to long prison terms for a joint.
I love this. It says so much about the experience - the hope for a different kind of future grounded in the reality of the present. You should write more (if it's not already written) about how society changed after this, especially from this kid's point of view.