The 9 days of Jerry ended yesterday

[twirlgrrl]

It all rolls into one
And nothing comes for free
There's nothing you can hold for very long
And when you hear that song
Come crying on the wind
It seems like all this life was just a dream



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nI0LORi2XHc

Comments

[jennifergroovy.livejournal.com]

I almost posted yesterday that it was the 13-year anniversary of his passing. I'm going to say something in my journal about it today. Hard to believe. The day it happened I was sleeping and my wasband woke me up saying Bean Girl was on the phone with something urgent. What a sad sad day. Deadheads in Seattle converged at the Seattle Center (the flag pavilion, near the space needle) just like fans had done had one plus year earlier when Kurt Cobain died.

[twirlgrrl.livejournal.com]

I was here. I didn't take many pictures but there were shrines and piles of roses all over the Haight and the park. My boss gave me the week off. It was indescribable. I still can't watch something like that Youtube video above without crying. I really miss Jerry... I miss the whole thing. The traveling village where I truly lived is packed up and gone.

[alexisyael.livejournal.com]

While I am not much of a deadhead (ok, hardly at all, there's only a few songs I liked -- which is amusing cause looking at me, everyone always thinks I'm a deadhead, the hippy/ boho genes run strong in my family) my aunt was. And the dead truly were life-changing for so many.

May Jerry's memory be a blessing for peace.

Also, your icon is tripping me OUT.

[twirlgrrl.livejournal.com]

Yeah, you do kindof look like a Deadhead--more than me, anyway! :)

Life-changing is the right word. Thanks for your kind comment.

[alexisyael.livejournal.com]

I know! And yet, I listen to much more punk, goth, grunge, alternative and rap! I graduated in the 90s, what can I say.

Growing up in Northern CA, you probably aren't surprised that I met a lot of people who SWORE they had seen me at a dead show. My aunt even called us one time, saying she thought she'd seen me at a show but I was dancing naked around a fire (or something like that, she was still high when she left this message!) so she didn't think it really was me, but if it was, hey cool...

Have you seen the documentary Festival Express? I highly recommend it, if you haven't! We saw it with my dad, which sparked some AMAZING new revelations from him (like, when he hitchhiked to SF as a teenager and ended up at a Janis Joplin concert and someone on her staff heard him talking -- he's from TX and has a thick accent -- and invited him backstage to meet her b/c she was homesick. Stuff like that. WOW.) I'd heard many of my mom's stories from the day, but hearing my dad's is a new thing for me, since they got divorced when I was really little.

[twirlgrrl.livejournal.com]

Yes, I have Festival Express. I love it so much. I love Janis, and that scene where she's ribbing Jerry is priceless. Also seeing Jerry drunk, and that song he sings about the cold Jordan. Those are my absolute favorite moments. What a PARTY that trip was. And it's funny, my favorite Janis video (which is not available on DVD yet dammit) shows her talking onstage about something that "we were just saying on the train." So it's from that tour. :D

I love your dad's stories! That's great! One of my best friends' moms started the Family Dog with Chet Helms, who was the guy who brought Janis out from TX to get started here in SF. She has some great stories too. I need to go get more of them out of her. :)

Hey, haven't I seen you dancing naked around a fire?

[alexisyael.livejournal.com]

Another of my favorite stories from my dad is about him playing poker with the Ramones. Yeah, he's cool!

My mom was friendly with Jerry's wife. They both went to the same crazy New Age church.

Maybe it was a naked moshpit? (yeep!)

[twirlgrrl.livejournal.com]

Which wife?

Naked moshpit, now *that* is a recipe for serious injury!

[alexisyael.livejournal.com]

AFAIK, his widow, Deborah Koons (who I don't think my mom liked very much? But... I may be wrong on that.)

Serious injury, or lots of *ahem* "injuries?" :rowr

[alexisyael.livejournal.com]

She might also have known Mountain Girl, you never know... my mom was friends with Jeannine Parvati Baker in college (who tried to get her to have a VBAC, but mom was too scared to attempt it).

Yeah, my mom's stories are pretty trippy, too (for example, she hitchhiked to Altamont from Santa Rosa (where she grew up) and was there when the person got killed by the Hell's Angels.

[jerrygarciuh.livejournal.com]

We spent a the afternoon in a park with the boys and during lunch my pod choose to play "When the Hunter Gets Captured by the Game" and "Touch of Grey". I thought this was kinda funny as they are probably one of the least known and one of the most ubiquitous of all his recordings.

Without a doubt almost all of my very best moments before becoming a parent happened while at his feet grinning like a fool or running wild through the Williamsburg night with my friends singing along.

My eight year old always refers to him as Unca Jerry and when Isaiah gets bigger he will too.

I was here in New Orleans on that day. The next day I got Cats on my shoulder to always remind me of him and of those days. I have never felt the urge to connect with other Heads since then. It was really just all about Jerry to me.

[twirlgrrl.livejournal.com]

That's funny about Hunter and Grey--so true about them being on the opposite ends of familiarity for most people.

We do the Uncle Jerry thing too. :)

It's interesting to me that you don't want to connect with other Heads. Well, for me maybe truly connecting would entail staying up all night and other stuff that I don't do anymore, but I really love going to see DSO and soaking in the atmosphere. The prevailing mood and social mores of the scene are still so precious to me. And DSO tends to attract actual Deadheads. For me it was about the music AND the society, but especially the music, and most especially Jerry. The world is totally different without him in it.