AUGUST 30, 1978 - JOURNAL ENTRY

Summer will be over soon, the equinox is only three weeks away. winds from the North signal the impending change in seasons. the rustle of leave underfoot foretell the approach of autumn. Last night a cold gust caught me unaware. Winter, the coldest season of all hates to be forgotten.

A delicate butterfly bobbles against the August sky. Its shoulder-high flight dodges cars and trucks on 1st Avenue I pray out a warning to the danger The butterfly soars above the traffic. Preserving its beauty And the hope for mine.

I want to write a short story combining my trips to Evans Notch, the Moose Bar and Grill, and Peter Gorr's spooky mountain retreat. Lately I have been inspired by reading HP Lovecraft and sense the mysteries of the Other Side.

Our Boy Scout troop camped atop Evans Mountain next to the ruins of a stagecoach inn, a two-story wreck with a gaol in the damp basement. That evening the troop leader told a campfire tale of three Dartmouth students vanishing the night before the Thanksgiving of 1943. We went to sleep scared to the marrow.

As a teenager I checked the records from the surrounding towns without finding any information affirming the incident that although the East Village isn't very conducive to traveling through dimensions other than with LSD.

Last night Alice was hurt by my staying out all night. Her decision to sleep alone drives me out of the apartment, despite loving me and wanting to share all her pleasures and woes. Once I woke, she said she had risen at dawn and watched me sleep for several more hours.

"Your chest rose and fell so gently, but your sleep seemed like too much a waste of the day."

Beware of Moose

Several Christmas Eves ago I traveled north from New York to Boston on the Lucky Star bus. My sisters and I attended a party at our old next door neighbors from the South Shore. Everyone was in good spirits. I drank a little more than more but not more than everyone. It was a time of good cheer.

The next morning I woke at my eldest sister's house and we handed out gifts around the Christmas tree. The dinner table was set for eight. My sister, her husband, their two kids, her daughter's boyfriend, and my aunt and uncle. A baked ham was a departure from the traditional turkey, but a welcome change from the Big Bird.

Old stories of Maine dominated the table.

My mother putting my brother and I on a train alone, my uncle throwing a dime at the Portsmouth tollbooth, my watching bears at the dump were only few of the legends reworked by the gathering. My niece's boyfriend was new to our family and the logging trucker didn't say much, although everyone was impressed by his present to my brother-in-law.

A set of gigantic moose antlers.

"Find them all the time on the back roads. They fall off in the fall. Thought you might like them."

"Like them?" David was ecstatic.

"They're great." I was jealous and said, "Back in 1995 I was on a good trip with my old girlfriend."

"Ms. Carolina?" asked my brother-in-law.

"Exactly." I knew he was partial to her cooking. She was a good woman. "We stopped at Govonis Italian Restaurant outside of North Woodstock."

"On Lost River Road." My uncle Russ knew the place. The little restaurant sat on a rocky gorge. It was the only good Italian restaurant between the White Mountains and Quebec.

"We had veal and a couple of bottles of wine. The place was packed, because it was Laconia Biker Weekend. We hadn't been able to find a motel room in Woodstock and I told the waitress that I was driving over to North Conway."

“Be careful about the moose," a biker warned in dead seriousness.

"I'm from Maine. I know moose." They were big.

We paid the bill and walked to the car. Ms. Carolina stopped in the parking lot crowded with Harleys.

“You want me to drive?” My driving scared Mrs. Carolina 1995.

“I've been riding these roads since I was six.” Most of them as a hitchhiker or backseat driver behind my father. "Gimme the keys."

"Only if you drive slow." It was a moonless night.

"I'm in no hurry."

The Kancamagus Highway was under construction and I drove at 30 mph over the mountains. Nearing the pass I spotted movement in the underbrush.

"Yeti?" My brother-in-law joked at the Christmas table.

“Moose?” Mrs. Carolina 1995 eyed the passing herd.

“Moose.” The bull was 10 feet tall with 15-foot broad antlers. An accident with him would have been a fatality and the bikers back at Govonis could say, “He said he knew all about moose.”

I drove away from the pass convinced that moose were the king of the road.

"Lucky you didn't hit one. They come through your windshield and you're dead man," my uncle spoke trucker spoke with authority. The thirty year-old had had several near-accident on the back roads off the West Branch of the Penobscot.

"Yeah, your next-door neighbor on the Lake had a patient who had hit one while driving a motorcycle." I was speaking to my brother-in-law. I needed him as back-up, since my family considered many of my stories to be myths.

"We had been sitting with Carrie at the end of the dock, watching an August meteor shower. He worked at Maine Medical taking care of recovering drunks. A postal worker had been missing in action for several weeks and when he showed up again, Carrie barely recognized him. The man said he struck the rear end of a moose and his face was brushed away by its bristles. Said it cured him of drink for the time being."

"That would do it for me." My niece's guest said succinctly. Someone people might have thought Mike was brusque. They didn't know Maine or its way of speech.

"That can't be true." My aunt doubted the veracity of my tale, but my brother-in-law interjected, "I heard the same story. I don't know it to be 100% true, but Carrie doesn't tell stories like some people we know."

All eyes but my those of my niece's boyfriend gazed at either my uncle or me.

We were guilty as silently accused, however as I always like to say, "All stories are true if interesting."

Moose in Maine are traffic hazards. The big relatives of elk are responsible for hundreds of accidents in the Great State of Maine. The DOT suggest the following measures to avoid collisions with moose.

* Drivers should reduce their speed when it is dark.
* Use your high beams where it is appropriate
* Always have everyone buckle up
* Search the roadway ahead to identify potential problem

If you feel a moose-vehicle collision is inevitable, follow these suggestions from the Maine Warden Service:

* Apply the brakes
* Let off the brakes just before impact
* Aim to hit the tail portion of the moose
* Duck down to minimize injury

IN DA GADDA VIDA ON SNOW

In winter of 1969 I went skiing in North Conway with a bunch of people. We hit Wildcat hard. The coolest girl and I listened to IN DA GADDA VIDA in my bedroom. Her name was Susan. She smoked weed. I was straight.

At the end of the song she said, "I leaving for San Francisco with some ski bums, you wanna come."

"I wanna ski tomorrow."

"Up to you."

I woke in the morning and she was gone. I can never hear Iron Butterfly without thinking of Susan.

I used to remember her last name.

Tuckerman's Ravine is still crazy this time of year.

I don't ski anymore.

But maybe tomorrow.

To hear IN DA GADDA VIDDA please go to this URL.

A Susan is waiting for you.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UIVe-rZBcm4

THE UMPTEENTH COMING by Peter Nolan Smith

"This is the dawning of the Age of Aquarius"

These words were sung by the cast of HAIR in 1969 and millions of hippies dropped acid to touch the sky of Aquarius.

I wanted to be one of them and the Fourth of July 1970 my friends John Gilmour, Tommy Jordan, Mark McLaughin and I scoring a couple of hundred hits of LSD from a French-Canadian hash dealer in Montreal. We dropped the Orange Sunshine after entering the USA at Canaan, New Hampshire. The backroads were lightly traveled and my VW Beetle meandered down Route 3 toward the White Mountains. The acid came on strong at the T-intersection of 110 and 3 at Groveton.

We didn't have a map and Mark asked an old farmer sitting on a lawn chair, which was the best way to Mount Washington.

"Are you in a hurry?" His accent was non-rhotic Granite State.

"We have all the time in the world." I was 18.

"That's what all young men say." He took off his straw hat and looked at the intersection. "Most travelers take 3 down to Lancaster and east on 2, but a few head over to Berlin."

Berlin was a logging town.

"Which one you take?" My voice shimmered with color, mostly green.

"Depends on where I'm going, but I like driving along the Upper Ammonoosuc River. It's very twisted."

"Thanks for the information."

Mark and I looked at each other.

"Go left," said John in the back. "Always take the road less traveled."

It was the hippie way and I beeped the horn before heading down 110.

An AM radio station from Burlington played War's SPILL THE WINE, Free's ALL RIGHT NOW, Mungo Jerry's IN THE SUMMERTIME before fading into static behind the airwave shadow of Mt. Cabot.

Berlin blurred under the blue sky and the pines wavered with the breeze. This was the North Country. The wind riffled across our ears. I drove slowly up 16 with snow gleaming atop Mount Washington.

A river ran to our right.

"Quiet." I shut off the engine and coasted down a dirt road to the bank of the Peabody River. "Me too," replied the three friends.

We were on the same plane.

The four of us got out of the bug.

The mountain stream rushing over glacial rocks to create a primordial language. Our teenage ears listened to its teachings and we obeyed the command to submerge our bodies in the torrent's lecture. Our communion with LSD immuned our flesh from the frigid winter melt. Time melted faster than butter in the sun.

"Speak, river, speak." John was all ears.

Our skin was turning blue.

I strained to understand the river's message.

A young boy in shorts appeared from the trees. He was wearing an Andre the Giant tee-shirt.

John Gilmour elbowed me.

"It's him."

"Him who?"

"Him."

“I don't who him is, but we don't need him to bring us down. What you want, kid?” Tommie was a stickler for keeping crowds small while on LSD.

"Why are you were sitting in the water?

"To hear it speak," Tommie answered without hesitation. He was a high school hockey star. On ice his skating was almost holy and Tommie was the was the most spiritual of us.

The eleven year-old stuck a finger in the river.

"I don't near nothing, but the water."

We cocked our ears to the current.

The boy in the shorts was right.

"We hear the water too."

We were on an ancient quest.

"And it's cold."

"Yes, it is cold."

We stood up with goose-bumped skin. The release from the river was a rush.

“Come out of the river.” The young boy ordered with biblical authority.

"Whatever you say.” Tommie Jordan chattered through this teeth.

Mark’s skin was death white and I shivered like I had been pulled from the Atlantic after the sinking of the Titanic. This boy had saved us from hypothermia. His coming here was no accident.

"Who are you?" I asked, blowing into my hands.

"Bobby."

"No, you're not."

"Am too."

"You're someone else." Someone famous and John's retinas opened to the max, as he whispered, "It's Jesus."

"Jesus." I might have been a non-believer, but I flashed on the 12 year-old Messiah in the Temple. Bobby was about his age.

"What are you talking about?" I was a firm non-believer.

"He's the Second Coming." John was on a vision.

"I've been here before." The boy picked up a rock and threw it into the river.

"Here before?" I asked with time repeating over and over again like a reshuffled deck of cards.

Yes." Bobby liked simple answers and before we could pose the right questions, a teenage girl in a tube top hurried from the underbrush. Red hot pants hung off her skinny ass.

"Bobby, you get over here." The redhead was about 15. Her skin was milk white.

"I wasn't doing nothing." Bobby was a member of her family.

"What I tell you about speaking to strangers." She grabbed her brother. Her tube top was no protection from our eyes.

“I wanted to know why they were sitting in the river.” Our prophet attempted to escape her clutches.

“Why? Because they’re stupid hippies.” She was teenage trouble to men and boys.

"We're not stupid hippies." I was enlightened by LSD. Bobby was Jesus. His sister was blind.

"I know stupid when I see it. You're fucked up on LSD too." The sister seized Bobby by the ear and our ‘Jesus’ squealed in defeat, as she dragged her brother away from the river.

"Don't take him away." John scrambled over the glacial rocks.

"Let him go." Mark slipped on a mossy rock into the river.

"But he's____"

"Look." John pointed through the trees.

Bobby's family was setting up a barbecue. His father regarded us with a command to keep our distance. This was their holiday destination.

Bobby had been here before, but only in this lifetime.

"So he's no Jesus."

"He was a for a minute." John laughed with the LSD.

"He's just a kid we thought was Jesus. Listen." Mark was lying in the water.

The river had resumed its music. Its song were never played on the radio. We lay in the river and sang its lyrics until our throats were parched dry as the summer grass. Drinking the river was a sacrament. We clambered from the water and sat on the rocks. Bobby's family left in the direction of North Conway. We came down under the pine trees. The night rose from the east.

"You know they're lighting off fireworks on the Charles." John loved watching the Boston Pops playing the 1812 OVERTURE. The fireworks were a wonder of pyrotechnics.

"We missed it this year."

"But not our trip." John smiled in the darkness.

The moon floated across a universe of nova stars.

"It was something else."

We spread our sleeping bags and lit a fire.

"You know there is no God." I had to say it.

"And there is no Jesus." Mark had been quiet for hours.

"But there is a Bobby." Tommie lit a joint. It was good Acapulco Gold.

"And he has a hot sister."

Our heads bobbed in agreement, because even an atheist on LSD can believe a small boy with a sister in a tube top can be Jesus.

After all acid is only a drug and this everyday is the dawn of the Age of Aquarius.

THE WORDS OF A CHILD by Peter Nolan Smith

"This is the dawning of the Age of Aquarius"

These words were sung by the cast of HAIR in 1969, a year marked by Altamont and the inauguration of Richard M Nixon.

Aquarius swiftly became an unattainable dream state for the hippies, unless you were high of LSD and millions of us dropped acid to touch the sky.

On the Fourth of July 1971 my friends John Gilmour, Tommy Jordan, Mark McLaughin and I celebrated psychedelic holiday in the White Mountains of New Hampshire. We were driving down from Montreal after scoring LSD from a French-Canadian hash dealer. The backroads were safer and I drove my VW Beetle through the Green Mountains to cross the Connecticut River into New Hampshire.

We were 18 and the Rolling Stones' BROWN SUGAR was #1 on the radio, but we were listening to the Jefferson Airplane's AFTER BATHING AT BAXTER'S.

It was good for our heads, for the four of us dropped the acid in Berlin and the Orange Sunshine peaked on the road up to Mount Washington. Tuckerman's Ravine gleamed with the snow under the peerless blue sky.

I parked the Bug by the Saco River. We wandered in a daze and heard the mountain stream rushing over glacial rocks to speak a primordial language. Our teenage ears listened to its teachings and we obeyed the command to submerge our bodies in the torrent's lecture. Our communion with LSD immuned our flesh from the frigid winter melt. Time melted faster than butter in the sun.

"Speak, river, speak." John was all ears.

John Gilmour elbowed me.

The boy looked harmless.

“What you want, kid?” John was a stickler for keeping crowds small while on LSD.

" Why are you were sitting in the water?

"To hear it speak." Tommie answered without hesitation. He was the most spiritual of us. Tommie was a high school hockey star. On ice his skating was almost holy.

The eleven year-old stuck a finger in the river.

"I don't near nothing but the water."

We cocked our ears to the current.

The boy in the shorts was right. It was only water.

"And it's cold."

"Yes, it is cold."

We stood up with goose-bumped skin. The release from the river was a rush.

“Come out of the river.” The young boy motioned for us to come to him.

"Whatever you say.” Tommie Jordan chattered through this teeth.

Mark’s skin was death white and I shivered like I had been pulled from the Atlantic after the sinking of the Titanic. The four of us looked at each other. This boy had saved us from hypothermia. His coming here was no accident.

"It's Jesus." John whispered with his retinae gapping open to 11.

"Jesus." I might have been a non-believer, but I flashed on the 12 year-old Messiah in the Temple. The boy was about his age.

Before we could pose the right questions, a teenage girl in a tube top hurried from the underbrush. Her hot pants hung off her skinny ass.

"Jay Jay, get over here."

"I wasn't doing nothing."

"What I tell you about speaking to strangers." She grabbed out for her brother.

“I wanted to know why they were sitting in the river.” Our prophet attempted to escape her clutches.

“Why? Because they’re stupid hippies.”

"Stupid hippies." I felt enlgihtened.

"Fucked up on LSD too." She seized Jay Jay by the ear and our ‘Jesus’ squealed in defeat, as she dragged her brother back to the main road.

"Don't take him away." John scrambled over the glacial rocks.

"Let him go." Mark sat in the water.

"But he's____"

"He's just a kid we thought was Jesus. Listen."

The river had resumed its music. Its song were never played on the radio. We sang its lyrics until our throats were parched dry as the summer grass. Drinking the river was a sacrament and we came down under the pine trees. The moon floated a universe of nova stars. It was a good trip.

LSD fell out of favor in the 70s. The drug was too heavy for the times and the police hunted down the dealers. The lack of quality guaranteed bad trips, which was exactly what the Law wanted to suppress such a powerful medicine, although most recently the psychedelic and 'shrooms' has been reborn to combat depression and addiction as well as opening the doors of perception.

Experimenters are intrigued by the hallucinogen's effects on the human brain to experience revelations, especially with the long-term influence on the taker's sense of well-being. Federal officials have approved further research into psychedelics, but are very careful to skirt the outrage of the Right, for they feel the only real epiphanies come from contact with god and even an atheist like myself know how that on LSD>

Especially while listening to the Jefferson Airplane's AFTER BATHING AT BAXTER'S.

HAVE A GREAT 4TH OF JULY

To hear that LP please go to the following URL
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=25RAkXpQwnA