My Beautiful Hippie (23 page)

“Oh, yes! And when you answer, the person calling will see you, like a little movie.”

I wasn't so sure I wanted people to see me in my pajamas or with my hair all messed up. “Will you
have
to be seen?” I asked.

“I don't know how it's all going to work, Joanne, but it will be exciting to find out. Even cars will be different. By the year 2000, there won't be any wheels on them. They'll just hover about two inches off the ground!”

I wasn't impressed. How could anyone, especially Suyu, plan a future without Beethoven? I glanced down at the volumes of music at my feet. “Won't you want to sit down and play every once in a while?”

She wrinkled her nose. “Without practicing? It would only be frustrating. I have a recording of my senior recital. I'm happy with that. And now whenever I come to any big problem in computers, I'll think, I can solve it. I played my senior recital, and that's the hardest thing I'll ever do.”

Suyu chatted on, but I was having a hard time paying attention. Two treasure troves lay at my feet, and my fingers itched to dig in. As soon as she left, I dove for her Beethoven sonatas. With shaking hands, I flipped to the
“Pathétique.”
What? Dr. Harold had to remind Suyu to play staccato here, and count the rests there, and voice the melody here? Those were just the same things he'd told me! Suyu had had to
learn
this stuff just like me!

That summer the influx of hippies that filled Haight-Ashbury was not as great as it had been in the Summer of Love. Even hippies discouraged hippies from coming, like the ad in the Oracle that read, “Kansas City needs you. Start your own revolution in your own town.” The Diggers had stopped serving free meals in the Panhandle long ago, and with noise ordinances in effect, there were fewer free outdoor concerts. The cops routinely canvassed the neighborhood, searching for runaways and shipping them home. Photos of missing teens were taped on lampposts and in storefronts. By now Lisa Girardi's portrait was faded and
cracked. Her parents had hired a private eye without results; she had slipped away from the Fillmore without a trace. Hundreds of times I thought about hugging Lisa that February night. If only I had held on to her long enough for that camper to drive away without her.

I hardly saw anything of Rena. She was performing in summer stock in Santa Maria. Martin tried to come over a few times, but there were rules. He was banned from our house when my parents weren't home, and he was not allowed in my room ever. When we watched TV in the den, there was no touching. That last restraint wasn't exactly a rule, but it felt like one.

We preferred to meet at the coffee shops on Haight Street, usually the Tangerine Kangaroo. Once when Martin was there playing his guitar and singing, he invited me to join him onstage. We sang in harmony, him taking the top part. Coins and a few dollar bills were dropped into his open guitar case.

“I'm hungry. You want anything?”

I shook my head. “I had lunch at home.”

“Cool. You can take over.” He set his guitar in my lap.

“Martin, no!” I whispered. “I can't do this by myself.”

He stooped to collect the money in his case before going to order at the counter. “You're a pianist! This is much easier than Beethoven.”

He was right about that. I launched into “Little Boxes.” Then I played “Leaving on a Jet Plane” and “Where Have All the Flowers Gone?” A group of tourists happened in, and were generous in their donations to Martin's case. As I was scooping out the money, Martin said, “You made a killing. You can donate some to the Free Clinic.”

“Not a chance. This is the first money I've made as a professional musician, and I'm keeping every cent of it.”

“Whoa, Joni, I didn't know you were such a capitalist pig,” said Martin, but he was laughing.

I tried to get him interested in rehearsing together. “We could be like Simon and Garfunkel.”

“That's two guys.”

“Okay, then. Peter, Paul, and Mary, without Paul. Or Peter.”

Martin just shook his head. “Spontaneous is better. Rehearsing would take all the fun out of it. Soon we'd be at each other's throats like Gus and the guys in Roach.”

Everybody worked to get Eugene McCarthy nominated as the Democratic antiwar candidate. Martin was one of the many hippies who trimmed his hair in order to campaign door to door as part of the “get clean for Gene” effort. Maxine had gotten Denise a secretarial position in the women's studies department at Cal, and Denise had applied to a scholarship program that sponsored “returning women students.” In her spare time, she wrote editorials promoting McCarthy, which appeared in the
Oracle
, the
Berkeley Barb
, and other publications under the byline D. Donnelly.

Our efforts were wasted. In August, amid a violent clash between ten thousand protesters and 23,000 Chicago policemen and National Guardsmen, the 1968 Democratic National Convention named Vice-President Hubert Humphrey its party's candidate. Humphrey seemed unclear about what he would do about the war. Whatever he decided, it was probably be too late for Dan. He'd been drafted and was expected to be deployed in early December.

Denise and Jerry kept their separation private to avoid having their parents interfering in their affairs. I was almost sure Mom was on to them because it seemed so obvious. Denise and Jerry had invited us to dinner at least once a month, and those invitations had stopped. If Denise or Jerry accepted an invitation for both of them from Mom, Denise came alone and made an excuse for Jerry, or vice versa, or they both canceled at the last moment.

Jerry had to get a part-time job at the copy shop to cover his rent. It was a good thing I had taught him to make hot dogs, because that was about the only meat he could afford. I went over to Berkeley about once a week to continue his liberation lessons: cooking, laundering, vacuuming, waxing, and window washing.
His biggest obstacle was scouring out a gunky frying pan. As soon as he approached it, he started gagging. Wimpfield! I had to buy him a Teflon pan with my own money.

At the end of August, Jerry got the nerve to invite Denise to dinner. I came over in the afternoon to supervise as he cleaned the apartment and made the meat loaf, baked potatoes, and tossed green salad. Everything was ready on time. Ten minutes ticked by, and no Denise.

“Is this her game? Getting me all excited about seeing her, then not showing up?”

“She'll be here.”

Jerry flipped through an old
Berkeley Barb
and pointed to an editorial by D. Donnelly. “Do you read this guy? He's pretty good.”

I looked over to what he was pointing at. “That's Denise.”

He laughed out loud.

“It is. I thought you knew.”

Jerry read over the article, smiling proudly. “She can write, that's for damn sure. D. Donnelly, for God's sake. Has she gone back to her maiden name legally?”

“She wasn't sure you'd want your name on her writing.”

“It's her name, too!”

“I think if she gets back with you, she'll want to go by Denise Donnelly hyphen Westfield.”

Jerry grimaced. “Hell! What's this world coming to?”

“Smile. I hear her coming.”

Denise had lost weight and wore a chic minidress, bursting with yellow Pop Art flowers. She'd cut her hair into a shoulder-length pageboy with long, sexy bangs that dipped over her dark, smoldering eyes. Jerry looked at her so long, I thought he was going to drool on his shirt.

Denise noticed me and her eyes narrowed. “What's going on?” She looked into the living room as if she expected to find our whole family there, waiting to ambush her in some sort of intervention.

“I'm here to chaperone,” I said cheerfully. Actually it was to referee.

She sniffed. “And you cooked dinner?”

“Nope. Jerry did.”

“Jerry can't boil water.”

“That was lesson one,” he said. “Joanne taught me. I can't guarantee how good the meat loaf will be. This is my first try. Have a seat.”

Jerry pulled out a chair for Denise, thought better of it, then pushed it back so that she nearly landed on the floor. Denise and I seated ourselves, and Jerry served us before taking his place.

“Everything looks beautiful,” said Denise.

“Thanks.” Jerry took a bite of meat loaf and began looking around the table.

“Oh, the salt,” said Denise, starting to rise. “I'll get it.”

“Harrumph! Harrumph!”
I cleared my throat loudly, and Denise sat back down.

Denise looked at Jerry, and Jerry looked at Denise. I think it hurt them both a little that Jerry got up to get the salt, when Denise had gotten it for him dozens of times in their short marriage.

“Does your aunt come in to do the apartment?” asked Denise.

“Joanne is my slave.”

“Oh, I am not! Jerry cleans the apartment himself.”

“Yep, yep,” said Jerry. “It's all true. I cook, clean. Just your regular little houseboy, I am.”

I jabbed him with a flying elbow.

“Ow!”

Denise giggled.

Jerry took her hand. “You look really pretty.”

“Pretty?” I exclaimed. “Knockout gorgeous.”

Denise smiled back at Jerry. “You look pretty good yourself, but you've got a little scorch under your arm.”

Jerry checked his sleeve under his armpit. “Damn! Ironing isn't easy.”

When the main course was finished, I rose to help Jerry clear the table. “I got it, Beethoven. Just relax. Ice cream is coming up.”

“Certainly I can help our gracious host clear.”

“Let him do it, Joanne. I'm enjoying this.” Denise gazed up at Jerry, who leered down at her. Who needed ice cream? They looked ready to have each other for dessert.

I was trying to think of a graceful exit when Denise asked, “How's your dissertation going, Jerry?”

“A little slower now that I'm working at the copy shop, but it's going.” He set dishes of ice cream before us and sat down.

“I wish it weren't on Freud,” said Denise. “He's done so much harm to women.”

“Not true. He was a great comfort to many women suffering from hysteria. Through psychoanalysis he was able to alleviate their symptoms of hallucinations, amnesia, and paralysis.”

Denise's prim mouth tightened. “This so-called hysteria in women was brought about because in Freud's time women were prohibited from doing important work.”

“They could do important work. They just didn't have any.”

Denise let her spoon drop with a clatter. “Freud thought the female sex was an incurable disease!”

Jerry paused and looked under the table. “Just checking to see if you still shave your legs.”

“I
still
shave my legs! And you're
still
a chauvinist pig!” Denise grabbed her purse and stalked out of the apartment, slamming the door so hard the salt shaker fell over.

“That went well,” said Jerry.

I raised a forefinger. “Up to a point.”

At sunrise, tambourines and drums echoed through Buena Vista Park, where Martin and I stood with about a hundred other people. It was October 6, three days after my seventeenth birthday, and we were participating in another hippie celebration, “Birth of the Free Spirit.” Like other “Happenings” in Haight-Ashbury, it was street theater, partly serious, partly burlesque. The important thing seemed to be that individuals were a part of something bigger than themselves, many people becoming one, the same kind of feeling you got on LSD, illegal now for two years.

We lit candles and began to process down Haight Street, which was decorated with banners reading
BIRTH OF THE FREE SPIRIT
.

Martin raised his fist in the air and shouted, “Be free! Be free! Be free!”

I felt shackled. Only a month of my senior year had passed, and it felt like an eternity until I graduated. “The crowd is pretty thin,” I said. “Not like last year.”

He waved his hand. “But look at all these impostors still hanging on. The real hippies got crowded out by all the plastic ones. It's time to just be people again. Real people. Individuals.”

At the intersection of Haight and Ashbury, I looked up at the street sign and marveled at such a landmark being so close to my own home. The procession continued into Golden Gate Park
and onto Hippie Hill, people chanting, “Be free! Be free!” Some people yanked off their hats, bandanas, love beads, and other articles of clothing and flung them into the trees.

Martin threw his beads, and they caught on a high branch. “Now yours,” he said to me.

I tucked mine under my shirt. “I could never part with these beads. They're the first thing you ever gave me.”

“Celebrate, Joni! The Age of Aquarius is over. It was all just a dream, a lovely dream.”

“Say it was more than that, Martin.”

“Peace and love and brotherhood? We can still hope for these things, but everything comes to an end.” Martin looked down at the ground and then back up at me. “There's something else that has to end, Joni. Byron quit Roach, and Bread is pretty much useless. They'll never cut that album. They're a one-hit wonder. Gus still doesn't see it. He can't let go. He wants me to join the band, and you know how I feel about that. It's best I move on.”