CA Update - Ed Lewis

Ed Lewis is a Board Member of the Sacramento Storytellers Guild as well as the Storytelling Association of California where he produces a monthly event called "Genre Storytelling". He has taught storytelling classes for teachers and performed for adults sharing Personal Stories and Tall Tales since 1994.

Hitchhiking to the Summer of Love

After reading *On the Road* by Jack Kerouac and the poetry of Allen Ginsberg, I joined 100,000 fellow hippies from around the world in descending on Haight-Ashbury, San Francisco, during the "Summer of Love" in 1967. We were on a mission to promote communal living, environmental justice, and social change. Down with the patriarchy! Long live sex, drugs, and rock 'n' roll! Being able to groove to Jefferson Airplane, Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, and the Grateful Dead was definitely an added bonus.

My journey began with "sticking out my thumb" on a Highway 5 on-ramp in Seattle while passing a few joints to about ten other hippies who were heading to the Haight. I was carrying my saxophone, and others had tambourines and guitars. Smoking and jamming made any waiting a breeze. Within an hour, we had all gotten a variety of rides.

My first ride was with a Basque sheep farmer who was going to Oregon to herd a flock of sheep into the Mount Hood area, where the grass was sweet and long. He dropped me off about 20 miles south of Portland around noon. I joined another group of ten hippies who were also on the road to the Haight. Drugs were freely shared, along with cheap Mad Dog 20/20 wine. Within 30 minutes, a large rental truck pulled over, and two long-haired hippies hopped out, smoked a few joints with us, and said they had room for everyone. They were heading to the Haight to pick up 20 pounds of marijuana and 10 pounds of hashish.

When they rolled up the back door, the strong smell of weed wafted over us, and we saw 15 mostly naked men and women waving us in for the party. Since we were in our 20s and our brains' prefrontal cortexes were still stuck in the preschool stage, we jumped right in, stripped down, and brought out our stashes and cheap wine. We definitely let the good times roll for about an hour.

I soon found out why everyone was naked—it was 90 degrees outside, and the back of the truck was like an oven. But the party had to go on, so we brought out the instruments and cut loose. The only problem was that breathing was becoming difficult. I started to worry when a couple of my newfound friends passed out and had shallow breathing, but I was a bit too high to figure out what to do about it. Fortunately, we pulled into a gas station a couple of hours later, and everyone got out of the oven. Fifteen of the crew said goodbye, and I quickly found the driver. I let him know I had worked construction and had a license for driving heavy equipment. I convinced him that I could drive the next eight hours to the Haight while they slept in the cab. Luckily, he agreed. The Black Beauty speed I took made the rest of the trip smooth and easy.

When we arrived in the Haight-Ashbury district, the streets were packed with hippies, gangs, musicians, bikers, and hundreds of onlookers. By then, I had connected with my drug-dealing truck buddies, and they invited me to stay at a "pad" they had in the Haight. For the next two months, I earned money by jamming on my saxophone on the street corner with a guitar-playing singer. We made enough money for drugs, food, and some amazing concerts. It was paradise!

Of course, paradise was doomed to fail, but I was able to make some lifelong friends, understand more about my path, and even hang out with my Seattle brother, Jimi Hendrix, who jammed at our "pad" as payment for some good drugs.

Peace, Brother!**

~Ed Lewis