I haven’t written a blog since my best friend John passed away a few weeks ago. It’s hard to find the right words when the silence left behind feels louder than anything I could write. I always considered John to be my best friend, and I tried to be his best friend. There was plenty of competition, though—he treated all his friends as best friends. That was John. He didn’t ration affection. He didn’t play favorites. He made you feel like the center of the room, even when the room was full. And somehow, you believed it—because with John, it was true.
John lived in Long Beach, Long Island with his wife Margaret. In a twist worthy of a song lyric, he met his wife Margaret one night while we were out celebrating my birthday. They raised three remarkable children—Eileen, Andrea, and Johnny—each carrying forward a piece of his spirit. Eileen, who illustrated my children’s book, lives upstate with her husband Christopher and their two children, Jack and Nora. Andrea is a scientist, married to Mark, and together they’re devoted Phish fans. Johnny works behind the scenes on television stages and at Lincoln Center, a quiet craftsman in the world of performance.
John and I met in 1971 at the N.Y. Telephone Co. We bonded over music, mischief, and the kind of friendship that doesn’t need explaining. We played on the same Telephone Company softball team, The Newtown Suns. He loved Family and Friends, Baseball, Music, and Long Beach. One year, Eileen gave him a birthday gift that lit him up—a guest DJ spot on a radio station in Woodstock, NY. That was one of his best days. He was in his element, spinning tracks and stories like he’d been born for it.
We had plenty of great times together. I went to all his parties, and after I moved to Lancaster, he came out here a few times a year to cheer on the Lancaster Barnstormers with me.
I have dozens of CDs he made for me. I can listen to them and think about him, but nothing can replace him. John loved Baseball, especially the Yankees. So, now that he joins Willie, Mickey, and the Duke in a Field of Dreams somewhere, I’ll play this song for him.
On July 20th, 1969, the world watched as the United States did something that seemed impossible—we landed a man on the moon. It was the birthday of my little brother, Kevin, who’s no longer with us. I was serving in the U.S. Navy, stationed at a small communications base in Todendorf, Germany, not far from the Danish border. That moon landing was more than just a scientific milestone. For me—and for millions of people—it marked the end of one war and the beginning of something radically hopeful.
After World War I, Germany was occupied by the French. After World War II, they were occupied by the Americans. Germans resented being second-class citizens in their own land. I know; I lived it. German parents warned their children not to associate with us. German girls who dated American servicemen faced sharp social backlash. There were three bars near our base and the neighboring German army camp—each one was a nightly battleground of bruises and booze, Americans and Germans clashing like ghosts of wars we never fought.
Then the moon changed everything.
The man behind the Saturn V rocket that carried the Apollo 11 crew to the moon was a German scientist named Wernher von Braun—formerly of the Nazi regime, yes, but now repurposed for peace. America and Germany, once locked in mortal combat, had collaborated to do the impossible. On July 20, 1969, two old enemies became pioneers—the hostilities of World War II ended, and something shifted. Almost overnight, we went from occupiers to honored guests. German fathers who once wouldn’t let their daughters near us were now shaking our hands and offering schnapps as we drank toasts to the American/German achievement. Things just got really good, really fast.
It helped that the Summer of Love was going strong —and not just in San Francisco. Europe was catching the fever. The British Invasion had brought music across the Atlantic to America earlier in the decade, but now American artists were reclaiming center stage. Multi-day concerts like Woodstock were turning music into a communal ritual. Europe wanted its own Woodstock.
England hosted the now-legendary Isle of Wight Festival in late August 1970. Hendrix. The Doors. The Who. Sly & the Family Stone. Joni Mitchell. Over half a million people filled the cliffs of Afton Down and tore down the fences in protest. It was glorious madness.
Germany followed suit.
That September, the Love and Peace Festival was held on the island of Fehmarn, near the town of Putgarten. It was a short drive from our base—maybe 20 or 30 kilometers. A few of us rock n rollers who were known for public drinking and private hash smoking got our tickets early. It was going to be our Woodstock. We had no tent, no gear—just youthful optimism and a plan to get as high as possible and see Jimi Hendrix.
Friday, September 4th, 1970: we arrived cold and wet. The rain came in sheets. We pushed in close to the stage and parked ourselves in the open, surrounded by tents and strangers. The picture of Jimi performing shows the crowd and the tents. We had no cover, no shelter, just mud and music. The crowd thickened. The lights faded. We sat shivering and soaked, waiting for Jimi Hendrix, who we were told would perform that night.
A stage announcement told us otherwise—he wouldn’t go on due to the weather. He was “rescheduled” for Saturday afternoon. (Years later I found out that this was all a lie. He wasn’t actually scheduled to perform until Sunday. He was performing two shows in Munich that Friday and Saturday.)
Disappointed but too cold and stoned to argue, we sat dejected in the mud. Finally at three A.M. we were roused out of our sluggishness by Mungo Jerry singing his happy little ditty, In the Summertime. Listening to bubble gum music while we sat shivering in the mud was the last straw. We trudged through the mud, “found” a hole in the fence, located our car, and went back to base where we took long hot showers and then slept.
By late morning, we were back in the muddy field, but with raincoats and a few supplies this time. The lineup that day included The Faces with Rod Stewart and Canned Heat, among other acts, but the crowd was tired. The mud was deeper, and the promises fewer.
Another announcement: Hendrix had been moved to Saturday night. We stayed. More bands played. More rain came.
Later: Another rain delay was announced. Jimi Hendrix would play Sunday morning instead.
We were miserable. Wet. Angry. Doubting.
And then came Sly and the Family Stone came onto the stage.
Sly emerged in the cold and the drizzle, standing there like a priest before a congregation in despair.
“Is anybody out there gettin’ wet?” We all groaned back at him. “Could you be any wetter?” he inquired. “No!” we yelled back at him.
“Well, if you’re already soaking wet and you can’t get any wetter” he shouted, “you’ve got nothing to lose. Get up, and dance to the funky music.”
The band exploded into “Dance to the Music,” and the crowd surged into life. We stomped, shimmied, and slipped in the muck, grinning like lunatics. For a moment, we weren’t miserable. We were in it—just as much as anyone in Max Yasgur’s field a year earlier. That was our Woodstock.
Unfortunately, their set eventually ended, and we catapulted back to grim reality. We didn’t go back to base, though. We slept in the mud. We weren’t taking any chances on missing Hendrix.
Sunday morning: more announcements. Hendrix wasn’t coming out until the sun did. In for a penny, in for a pound. We waited.
And then, the sun appeared. And the moment we’d waited for arrived:
“Ladies and gentlemen, The Jimi Hendrix Experience.”
The crowd booed. They had waited in the mud for two days, and they took out their frustration on the band.
Six hundred thousand cold, wet, burned-out souls let out the anger that had grown larger with each stage announcement that Jimi wasn’t going to play in the rain. But, now, Jimi just stood there in the sunshine, took it all in, and casually said:
“We don’t give a fuck if you boo. Just boo in key. Give us a second to tune up.”
He struck a single, sharp chord. It echoed like a thunderclap across the island.
And then the spell began.
What followed was unlike anything I’d ever seen. Jimi’s hands weren’t playing guitar—they were conjuring it. Notes bent like light in a prism. Sounds came from corners of the sky I didn’t even know existed. The audience fell into a trance. When Jimi Hendrix ended his set and walked offstage with a simple “Thank you,” there was silence.
Actual silence. No one clapped. We were all dazed, slack-jawed, staring at the stage. Did we just see what we just saw, or are we tripping? When we realize that what we saw was real, the dam broke, and we roared and cheered for 10 minutes. Then 600,000 people got up to leave.
A voice from the stage: “Wait, wait! We still have six more bands! Procol Harum is next!”
No one cared. No one could follow what we had just seen. We walked away in silence, with mud on our boots and stars in our eyes.
Four days later, we got the news that Jimi Hendrix was gone, found dead in London. And now, this week, Sly Stone has joined him.
They’re headlining tonight in Rock ‘n’ Roll Heaven. And you better believe that when I hear them play, I’ll be getting up and dancing to the funky music.
Today, it was raining as I went to the V.A. hospital in Lebanon, PA, and it reminded me of something that happened years ago in a city far, far away. I was reminded that while the destination is important, the journey can be just as important.
I was working for Publishers’ Phototype, Inc. in East Rutherford, New Jersey. My friend, Robert P. McAuley got me the job. (So, check out his books on Amazon. Though he is probably more well known for his contributions to Aviation Magazine, he’s written tons of terrific books about time travel in his 1800 Club series.)
Anyhow, the job was like a dream come true. P.P.I. was the middleman between almost every magazine and the printer. Middleman is grave misnomer, though, as most of the staff were female. So, after years in the military and working as a Frameman for the N.Y. Telephone Company, it was a pleasant change of routine to be surrounded by intelligent, interesting, sexy females. I did, however, manage to keep in on a professional level (no matter how much I tried not to).
I worked in a division known as CBS magazines. Working directly with the editors, we prepared every page of Boating, Popular Photography, Car & Driver, and a few other magazines to go to the printer. I loved it, but then something happened. I got transferred to the 4-12 shift. I don’t mind working odd shifts, but the bus home to Jersey City stopped running at 11 p.m.
So, my first night on the new shift, I had to walk home 7 miles. Two of those miles were on a stretch of Route 3 that goes over the Hackensack River. There was no pedestrian lane. I walked on a narrow shoulder of the road just about a foot wide. I was scared, and all the honking didn’t help. Then I got to four miles of Paterson Plank Road that was mainly occupied by junk yards and the junkyard dogs who guarded them. The barking was constant and scary.
The last mile was residential as I walked home fearlessly through my neighborhood, and I was pretty calm by the time I got home. I knew that I had to do something to improve the first six miles, though. I invested in a reflective vest, a flashlight that was the size of a war club, and a Sony Walkman cassette player.
So, the next afternoon, I went to work with a knapsack full of snacks, cold-packed beverages, vest, flashlight, Walkman, and my favorite cassette tapes. Since I was now more visible from a distance, the honking was greatly reduced as I walked over the bridge. The first two miles of the journey was a great improvement over the previous night.
On the four deserted miles of Paterson Plank Road, I cranked up the volume to 10, and roadside Karaoke was born. I couldn’t even hear the barking dogs, and they truly were, “Out of sight, out of mind” as I sang along to the tape.
I sang quietly on the last mile through residential streets, but I did have one more song to belt out. As I got within a block of my home, I sang You’ll Never Walk Alone, the song that Jerry Lewis always sang at the end of one of his telethons for “Jerry’s Kids.”
It was a 90-minute journey and I made special cassette tapes that made that journey the best part of my night. After I left that company, the thing I missed the most was that 90-minute walk home.
Today, I went to an appointment at the V.A. Hospital in Lebanon, PA. I don’t drive, but the V.A. provided me with a free Uber ride to and from the appointment. On the way back I saw that there was a paperback book in the seat pocket in front of me, “From Darkness Into Light.” I pulled it out and noticed that the author’s picture looked very similar to the one I saw in the rear-view mirror. I questioned him about it, and he told me all about his journey from troubled youth to respectable author. Then he performed an epic poem that he wrote one time while driving 300-plus miles from Pittsburgh to Philadelphia. It was incredible. I’m slightly deaf and the road noise was making it hard to hear, so I just kept saying “Louder” and he really got into the performance, keeping one eye on the road and the other on his spellbound audience in the rear-view mirror. Before I knew it, the sun was out, and I was home. Sometimes the journey is just as much fun as the destination.
On Monday, January 20, 2025, Donald J. Trump, a convicted felon, who is no longer permitted to own a gun, will be handed the nuclear codes as he is sworn in as the 47th President of the United States.
There might be a slight rumbling in the cemetery grounds in Plains, Georgia on that day as the flags that have been lowered to half-mast to honor President Jimmy Carter, will be raised to full staff for the day just to accommodate the Narcissist-in-Chief. The predicted cold weather, though, will force the ceremony to be held indoors. Too bad. I’d really like to see all the 77 million Maga-morons who voted for him freezing their asses off on the National Mall as they waited for the price of bacon and eggs to instantly come down. I guess that his staff will just have to Photoshop the indoor ceremony to make it look like a record crowd.
I’m wondering if all the people Trump nominated for cabinet positions will be there. If so, will there be anyone left to work at Fox “News” that day.
Of course, there will be entertainment. The one remaining member of The original Village People will sing YMCA, so that America will get to see Donald Trump do his “crazy hand jive” where he appears to be giving hand jobs to two people at the very same time.
I wonder if Trump will just use the same dance moves when Kid Rock takes the stage to sing:
Ahhh, they don’t write love ballads like that anymore.
I wonder if the bookies in Las Vegas are taking bets on which Bible he will use for the swearing -in ceremony. It has to be the $60 one he hawks with Lee Greenwood. Product placement, baby.
I also wonder if he’ll bother to bring back all the classified documents he has been storing in his Mar A Lago bathroom. Since he charges his Secret Service security detail an exorbitant amount for protecting him, while he is there, I can only think that he will also hand his new Secretary of the Treasury, a hefty bill for the four long years he has stored the documents. Let’s see, $2,000 a month for 48 months….
I can’t really see much difference between Trump’s new official photograph and his State of Georgia mugshot, but I guess he wanted to show a new suit and tie so he can peddle swatches of the material to his cult followers for $99 a swatch. After all, a buck is a buck, at least until Elon converts it all to Dogecoins.
I’m just surprised he isn’t wearing his pirate ear patch anymore. I guess they stopped selling.
So, America, enjoy the weekend, or like they say, “Eat, drink, and be merry for Monday we die or get deported.”
earlthepearl137 