I wrote this a couple of years ago, but as today is the... [turns away to fiddle with calculator. Oh my god, has it really been that long??!!] 25th anniversary of his death, I figured I really should post it someplace where others can see it.
Kim Beall - August 9, 2020
Fun Fact: I’ve been a sucker for long gray hair and beards for most of my adult life. I sometimes wonder if this is a holdover from my childhood awe of Santa Claus.
Not So Fun Fact: I have only ever been to two rock concerts in my life. Both of them were Grateful Dead concerts. Growing up, I never could have afforded to go to a concert, and even if I could have, my mom would not have allowed it. Maybe a John Denver concert, but I don’t think he ever played in my town. She would definitely not have let me go to a Grateful Dead concert!
When I got older and left home, I moved to California. Everybody there was into The Dead, and had been even before Touch of Grey came out in ’87 and made them popular with “the norms” (as Deadheads like to refer to people who wear shirts that button and pants that need pressing.)
I wanted to find out what this “going to a rock concert” business was all about, so I went along with some friends to a Dead show in LA. Jerry’s hair and beard were already pretty solid gray by then and I thought he looked kind of adorable. A lot better than he had in the 70s. By all accounts he was feeling better, too. That trademark toothy grin of his could be seen even from the cheap seats! Everyone believed Jerry had penned the lyrics to “Touch of Grey” in response to the diabetic coma which had nearly killed him in ’86. I’m pretty sure this was apocryphal, but still, the audience chanted “I Will Survive!” for so long when he came on stage that we missed almost half of the first song. I don’t even remember what song it was.
Well, it never did matter what they were playing, anyway! Everyone was having a good time. There were no scary freaks tripping balls all over the stadium (as my mother would have predicted.) Nobody tried to sell me any non-FDA-approved pharmaceuticals. Just a bunch of 9-to-5 drones having fun even though they were going to have to drink gallons of coffee to make it through work the next day. I mostly remember how happy and friendly everyone was, the joie de vivre in the air. It was just a celebration of life in general.
Naturally when I moved to North Carolina and the Dead came to Chapel Hill, I had to go and see them again, along with my new 9-to-5 drones. The atmosphere of celebration was, if anything, even more electric. After 4 hours we all stood up and demanded an encore, and the Dead played “The Weight” for us. It was so perfect, so fitting. I do believe it was and will always remain the absolute finest, most perfect moment in all of music history.
Jerry Garcia died two years later, at the age of 53, while making yet another attempt at addiction recovery. I remember thinking how unfair this seemed – that sort of thing should only happen to people who never make any attempt to get better, shouldn’t it?
But what really struck me, the thing I remember most, was that all of a sudden, the heavens felt heavier. Jerry wasn’t a skinny guy by the time he died. It felt like his added weight had made the sky more ponderous, somehow. I mean… he wasn’t the first of the Great Rock Stars to die in my lifetime. I knew he’d be joining Janis and Jim up there and that, by the time I died myself, there was going to be one hell of a heavenly rock concert going on! But it was Jerry who added gravity to the whole situation.
I was thinking about this as I drove home from Research Triangle Park about three weeks later. I was probably thinking about it because the radio stations were all still playing Grateful Dead about every four songs. Anyway as I approached the on-ramp to I-40 across from Imperial Center, I noticed traffic quite suddenly slowing to a crawl. Expecting to see an accident blocking the road, I looked ahead, but the congestion seemed to be starting where someone was walking along the verge. Some people were honking, though this pedestrian was not in their way. He was merely walking along, sometimes waving to those who honked at him. When I drew a little closer I saw he looked a lot like Jerry Garcia, and he was walking with a dancelike bounce in his step, bobbing his head as if he were listening to music. (This was long before the advent of ear-buds, by the way, kids!)
Ha! I thought. A Garcia impersonator, out entertaining the commuters, getting his kicks. How cool! How fitting! When my turn finally came to drive past him, I waved, too. He looked at me and grinned and I swear... that was no impersonator. Nobody could duplicate that grin. There was only one person ever in the world who could grin like Jerry Garcia, and that was Jerry Garcia.
The traffic, beyond where he was walking, had thinned considerably so I had to step on the gas and merge onto the highway. I did glance back once in my rearview mirror, however, and saw his silhouette still strolling on along the verge, waving like one of those dancing Dead bears. I like to think he walked on into the sunset behind me, after that, and made a final and real departure at last. Just another side road in a long, strange trip.
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