The Flight Back from California (rewritten from another blog)

To say that things were different back in the 70s would be an understatement. It may not have been the 60s, but the ripples from all that stuff carried on well into the mid-70s but were pretty much gone by the "ugly 80s." My friend George from California and I hung out with real hippies in our respective towns and when we were together. George is on the right, along with the wife and kids. That's a nice looking family. Go you, buddy!

 After high school way back in 1975 I went to stay with George out in Walnut Creek for a month. I couldn't have imagined all the stuff that went on on that trip, and I've told some of the stories. Besides a failed romance with George's sister, who turned out to be a Thespian anyway, I had the time of my life out there. I could write a book about my trip. Things happened that anyone would find interesting.

 The plan was for George to fly back with me and live in Alabama for a while while we planned our next move. We were going to form a drum/percussion duo, and come as a package deal no matter whom we might play with...you get one, you get the other. 

 Although many drummers and percussionists have formed long-term relationships, it would've been a unique arrangement to do it full time. I haven't heard of anything like it before or since. The beauty of it would be that we could swap instruments at any time. I'd have primarily been the drummer and George the percussionist I suppose, but it'd have been flexible. 

 George moved here from Chicago in '75 and we became instant friends. George was always really into music, and after meeting me he took an interest in the drums. Loving music to the degree he did goes a long way with me, but he had a natural affinity for percussion, and he got pretty good in a hurry. I was thrilled.

 What was interesting is that George is a lefty, and set up his kit and percussion rig lefty. Usually when a teacher is showing something to a student, and they have two kits facing each other, when the student watches the teacher it's like looking into a mirror, and he has to mentally flip the image, since both drummers will usually be rightys. Since George set up his rigs opposite to mine the image wasn't reversed. He learned very quickly. 

 Anyway this is supposed to be about the flight from California to here. I'd been out there for a month, and we were flying back on a late Saturday night flight. George had a couple of Montesa motorcycles he'd been trying to sell for months. They were very well-made bikes but they were expensive, and the market was very limited. He wanted to have some money to buy some percussion instruments and have some for a start in Alabama, and it'd have cost a fortune to have them shipped.

 Then the phone started ringing that morning and by noon he'd sold both bikes, with cash in hand. I don't remember how much it was but it was a lot. The rest of the day was a spending frenzy. We drove miles and miles, to three different places to get three different kinds of weed, and we hit several music stores. 

 He got tons of stuff including a Talking Drum, a set of Timbales, Bongos, shakers, a Vibraslap, a Flexitone, bells and various doodads...it was like Christmas morning on steroids, plus we had a couple of zeebers of all different kinds of really good grass, as we sometimes called it back in the day. We were ready.

 We packed everything into our luggage, including the weed, which you could smell through the suitcase, except we had a Proto Pipe, full of reefer, in one of our pockets. It's hard to imagine a time when you could carry a metal pipe, plus weed, onto a plane, much less have more in your luggage, but back then it didn't matter. You could smoke on planes back then, and we figured we'd hit the lavatory a time or two during the flight to "freshen up." Yep, times were different. 

 They were so different in fact that it was no problem having weed in our luggage and a pipe in our pocket. In fact we each had one in our pocket. George and his sister gave me one as a welcoming gift when I arrived in California, and he already had one. As it turned out they'd both get some good use. 

 I think the flight left around 11:30. Since it was a late flight there were maybe 35 passengers, if that many. I'm guessing it was a 747. We settled in for the flight but we were geeked. George had just bought about $1,000 worth of gear, and we had all this amazing weed. 

 Not long after the Fasten Seat Belts/No Smoking signs went off, George and I hit the lavatory. The great thing about smoking on airlines is that as long as the plane was in the air, the negative pressure sucked out everything including smoke. You could fire up a bowl and huff and puff like you were at a pot party and no one would smell a thing. 

 We got sufficiently stoned and went back to our seats. The atmosphere was very relaxed and it was really nice that the plane wasn't packed. A few people had gone to sleep but most people were awake. George and I were on the top end of the scale. We were about to start a life-changing project, and we had the shit to do it with. We started talking about all the stuff he'd bought and how we couldn't wait to test it out. 

  After a while we couldn't stand it any longer so we broke out some of the stuff, just to have a look. We took out the Talking Drum and several people took an interest. Someone asked what it sounded like so we gave them a quiet demo. A few more people took interest, and before long someone asked if they could try it. The Talking Drum was a great way to get people going. You can make it "talk" by squeezing the leather strands together which tightens the heads and changes the pitch.

 The person who first played it was having a blast, and pretty soon other people wanted to try it out. The people who wanted to sleep were totally cool. We grabbed some extra blankets and they went to the back of the plane and crashed. The rest of us turned in our seats to face each other. George and I handed out the rest of the percussion stuff, and pretty soon about 15 people were jamming, and an airborne drum circle spontaneously formed. 

 Like all good drum circles, a fun time was had by all. I don't remember any kids on the flight, but there were people of all ages joining in. Snacks and drinks were passed around. George and I were plenty stoned and passed on the drinks, but the snacks were really tasty.

 About halfway into the flight it was time for another bowl. We vibed that everyone was cool, and it was about the same as today...everybody smoked pot. We let it be known that there was a loaded bowl in the lavatory for anyone interested, and a good handful of people took us up on it. Both Proto Pipes spent most of the flight in the lavatory. At one point a sweet and observant stewardess figured out what was going on, and asked if she could have a little toke, like we were going to say no to her. Have I mentioned that times were a little different back then?

 The only way you could duplicate that scenario these days would be to charter your own plane, and even then it might not be as much fun. That all happened organically, and the last thing we figured would happen when we boarded the plane was that we'd be getting half the passengers and a stewardess high, not to mention playing our new drums for several hours, but the stars aligned. Nobody made or had to pay a dime, yet it was one of those musical experiences you couldn't put a price on anyway. 

 After we got back and settled in we got to work. Technically we were too young to get into bars but things were a lot looser, and we did get to jam live with some people, but mostly we played in the basement. George got a really nice used Ludwig kit, and with the help of my mom he refinished it in a beautiful burnt-orange tortoise-shell finish. He still has that kit and it still looks like a million bucks. It's unique. 

 We were having a blast and George was a quick study. I was learning too. We started to get really tight, which wasn't surprising because George and I could pretty much read each other's mind. We cooperated on things in general as friends, and we had that same cooperation when we played. We gave each other space and there wasn't much stepping on toes, as can happen sometimes with a drum/percussion duo. We'd approach things with a similar mindset. 

 The fact that George was a lefty made things interesting. It was more of a Yin/Yang thing than having two rightys. Usually a percussionist will be right-handed so he'll set up bongos, congas, timbales and such as a righty drummer would set up his drum kit- going from high pitch to low pitch, from left to right. I knew that back in the day the righty percussionists set up the opposite way, going from low to high pitch from left to right, like a piano keyboard. I set up my percussion rig that way too. 

 It made me play a little differently and that was cool. Since George's percussion rig was set up that way it was perfect. The fact that his drum kit was set up lefty was a different story. I'd only played righty, and trying to play lefty was almost like having to learn to pay all over again and more...I had to unlearn all of the usual beats and licks and such and flip it all backwards in my brain and in my limbs. It was a challenge but I enjoyed it.

 Sadly a situation arose that we couldn't have imagined in our wildest dreams, and George felt that he needed to move back. To say we were bummed wouldn't have done it justice, but who knows...maybe it's for the best. Maybe we'd have both died in a fiery van crash or something, but then again maybe we'd have carved out our deal and had a bast doing it. We'd still be playing in fact...both of us still play, but I guess it is what it is. A drum and percussion duo who played with one mind would've been a thing of beauty. Oh, well.

 Even though our thing didn't happen we still made some great memories, and we've stayed close. George got married and started a fam obviously, and he's still with the same company he was with when I visited him in 1975. For what it's worth it's a job that makes him good money but not a lot of fulfillment, and certainly not as potentially amazing as a career in music would've been, plus he was someone I enjoyed being with as much as anybody. He'd move back here in a heartbeat but his wife would leave him. I miss my buddy. We had some true adventures.

 It was certainly responsible for one of the most interesting commercial flights we've ever taken and a snapshot of bygone days. I bet a few of the other passengers thought about it occasionally for many years after. It certainly wasn't the first drum circle, but it's probably one of the relatively few that have taken place aboard a commercial flight, especially when combined with large quantities of serious smoke. That was a gift, and the reason you learn to play music in the first place. Cheers, partner! Rock on.