The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test (33 page)
Read The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test Online
Authors: Tom Wolfe
Tags: #United States, #Social Science, #General, #Popular Culture, #History, #20th Century
“ ⦠don't fight it ⦔
“ ⦠go with it ⦔
“ ⦠neither accept nor deny ⦔
“ ⦠go with the flow ⦔
“ ⦠we're with you ⦔
“ ⦠you're in the hands of experts ⦔
â
experts
âand the Pranksters are there rapping over her, riff after riff of wordsâand then Romney got hold of some Thorazine, a tranquilizer that is good at aborting bad LSD trips and he says, “Here, take thisâ”
experts
âand the Pranksters are there rapping over her, riff after riff of wordsâand then Romney got hold of some Thorazine, a tranquilizer that is good at aborting bad LSD trips and he says, “Here, take thisâ”
â
take this
âthe Who Cares Girl and Ray look at this costumed freak amid a group of costumed freaks, all zonked, trying to hand her a capsule of God knows whatâ
diabolism
âand Ray throws the Thorazine away and the Who Cares Girl throws it away, the capsules go skidding across the floor, and the Who Cares Girl goes:
take this
âthe Who Cares Girl and Ray look at this costumed freak amid a group of costumed freaks, all zonked, trying to hand her a capsule of God knows whatâ
diabolism
âand Ray throws the Thorazine away and the Who Cares Girl throws it away, the capsules go skidding across the floor, and the Who Cares Girl goes:
harruummmppparummmparrrrumppparruuuuuuumparum pauharuharummmpa mumbling along, drifting in and out of the freakout, giggling for a stretch and they say ah she's coming out of it and then:
“Who cares! ⦠Ray! ⦠Ra-a-a-a-ay! ⦠Oh, what's the use! ⦠Sex! ⦠Ray! Sex! ⦠Who cares!”
That phrase!
âit sticks in Romney's head. He can't get it out. Her scream shrieks over the hall, because now Babbs has brought up the microphone and holds it near her, right in front of Ray, solicitously, like
this
will do it. Ray's head sprockets around inanely. Babbs is getting it all over the microphone to make it
part of the test
ânot an isolated eventâbut All-one, anachoretic freakoutâ
Who cares!
Romney looks at Babbs and Who cares!âwell, Babbs cares, with one part of him, but with another his devotion is to the Test, to the Archives, a freakout for the Archives, freaked out on tape in the Archives, Who Cares in the Prankster Archives, and the cry wails over the hall, into every brain, including Clair'sâ
âit sticks in Romney's head. He can't get it out. Her scream shrieks over the hall, because now Babbs has brought up the microphone and holds it near her, right in front of Ray, solicitously, like
this
will do it. Ray's head sprockets around inanely. Babbs is getting it all over the microphone to make it
part of the test
ânot an isolated eventâbut All-one, anachoretic freakoutâ
Who cares!
Romney looks at Babbs and Who cares!âwell, Babbs cares, with one part of him, but with another his devotion is to the Test, to the Archives, a freakout for the Archives, freaked out on tape in the Archives, Who Cares in the Prankster Archives, and the cry wails over the hall, into every brain, including Clair'sâ
Romney can't get this insane cry out of his head,
Who cares,
and it becomes the Who Cares Test for him, and he is back at the
microphone, with his mission now, his voice furrowing into the microphone:
Who cares,
and it becomes the Who Cares Test for him, and he is back at the
microphone, with his mission now, his voice furrowing into the microphone:
“Listen, this girl's brains are coming out! and who cares? This girl's coming apart! and who cares? This girl's breaking up into crispy chips! and who cares? This girl's caked in the dust, nylon wall-to-wall on her eyeballs! and who cares?”
âand it was very clear. Everybody who cared would do something, pour on the Energy if nothing else, bleed Dimensional Kreemo for her, if they truly cared. It became a test for Romney, he could feel it, to find the depths of how much he caredâ
Who cares!
she shrieks
she shrieks
He cares!
he feels it, and feels himself growingâ
he feels it, and feels himself growingâ
âwhile the tapes reel it all in.
FINALLY, EVEN AT THE WATTS TEST THEY WEAR DOWN, AND those who are not into the pudding begin to drift off, and the Prankster diehards and a few discoverers like Clair Brush are still there, and Norman can tell it is coming, the magic hour, and Hassler gets up in a blue pageboy costume and does a funny beautiful slow dance to the music that is just perfect ⦠and Page is working behind him with the projectors, the film projectors and the slide projectors, and he sets up a really kind of gorgeous collage, moving projections on top of still projections ⦠and the Pranksters sit amazed and delighted and he makes slow changes, abstract patterns and projections from the slides and â¦
it all fits together â¦
everything â¦
it all fits together â¦
everything â¦
About 6 A.M., more cops, narcos now, six in plainclothesâand one of the diehard three-o'clock discoverers walks up to them and announces with a look of total acid-stoned glistening sincerity:
“Listen, I've got more Awareness, more ⦠Awareness, in my little fingernail ⦠My Awareness is so superior to yours that ⦠uh ⦔âobviously from the glistening strain on his face, there is no metaphor, no conceit, that can be concocted in the English
language that is enormous enough to express just
how
superior, and so his face falls back into a sweet sincere look, slightly played out, and he says: “How about getting us some cigarettes? We're all out.”
language that is enormous enough to express just
how
superior, and so his face falls back into a sweet sincere look, slightly played out, and he says: “How about getting us some cigarettes? We're all out.”
Strangely, one of them did and returned very quickly with a carton of Kools, which he passed around. Around 9 A.M. only the Pranksters, Clair and a few others are still aroundâand more copsâand finally they say to Babbs that he ought to get everybody out now, the L.A. sun is up, the good spades of Watts are going to work ⦠and the Pranksters troop out into the L.A. sunlight, the Devil with an orange face with silver stars, a tall wild-haired guy with half his face silver and half gold, Day-Glo crazies trooping out into the sunlight at 9 A.M. out of the chilled Pandemonium hatchery â¦
And Clair Brush: “It seems that's about it ⦠I've rambled incredibly ⦠Did it last? Am I different? I can't remember. It seems so, but I am not sure. When I get under black light, or a strobe, it comes back vividly â¦
“Del Close told me later I was wandering around looking âwonderful ⦠in the sense of full of wonder.' That's the best description I can imagine.
“I've taken LSD twice since then. Each time was different and much less dramatic, more personal, milder. The only strong similarity is the physical effect, which, for me, consists of contractions quite like labor pains and a quivering of the nerve-endings ⦠anticipatory ⦠for prolonged periods, the feelings of being on the verge of orgasm without any contact at all ⦠these things occurred all three times. Otherwise, all have been different.
“Take it again? Oh, probably someday ⦠but no urgency, no desire to run to my friendly corner pusher. I think the best way is to take it with a lover, but someone you're willing to have live in your head for a long, long time. Not too many of those around. It's a closeness not easily dismissed.
“All, all. Enough, I hope.”
ABOUT 1 P.M. THE PHONE STARTS RINGING IN ROMNEY'S apartment, waking him up: “Romney, you guys ought to be shot! ⦔ “Seven people committed!” ⦠“Freaked out!” ⦠“Atrocity!” And finally one from the L.A. police:
“Are you Romney? Listen, we got some
two-tone dude
down hereâ”
two-tone dude
down hereâ”
Oh, the Di-men-sion-al Kree-mo ⦠That would be Paul Foster. Four, five, six hundred people had been in that madhouse all night long having a goddamned orgy for themselvesâand the cops couldn't lay a hand on them. Soâin the sour-milk L.A. sunlight of 9 A.M. they had seen this gangling character rocking away from the building like a Druid, half his face gold, the other half silver, so they
busted
the mother, for being ⦠well ⦠drunk in public, or something equally likely. But by 1 P.M. they wish to hell somebody would come pick up this two-tone dude â¦
busted
the mother, for being ⦠well ⦠drunk in public, or something equally likely. But by 1 P.M. they wish to hell somebody would come pick up this two-tone dude â¦
Christ, man! It's too much for us even! We wash our hands of this ::::: Atrocity :::::
::::: what ⦠exactly have we done? and :::::
::::: even to some Pranksters, the anti-Babbs faction, the Test was a debacle. They doubted the ethics of springing the acid in the Kool-Aid, on the one hand, and thought the treatment of the Who Cares Girl, piping her freakout over the speakers, was cruel. Shortly after they got back to L.A. from La Jolla, the Schism broke out true and rife, out front. This was a great little Morbio Inferiore all its own, the
Life
Magazine Divide.
Life
Magazine Divide.
The Watts Test in L.A., coming on top of the Trips Festival in San Francisco, had caused the fast-rising psychedelic thing to explode right out of the underground in a way nobody had dreamed of. Leary and Alpert and their experiments had had plenty of publicity, but that seemed like a fairly isolated thing with a couple of Harvard docs at the helm and being pretty solemn-faced and esoteric about it, all in all. This new San Francisco-L.A. LSD thing, with wacked-out kids and delirious rock
'n' roll, made it seem like the dread LSD had caught on like an infection among the youthâwhich, in fact, it had. Very few realized that it had all emanated from one electric source: Kesey and the Merry Pranksters.
'n' roll, made it seem like the dread LSD had caught on like an infection among the youthâwhich, in fact, it had. Very few realized that it had all emanated from one electric source: Kesey and the Merry Pranksters.
A team from
Life
magazine turned up, led by a photographer, Larry Schiller, who was on to the LSD world and had taken the pictures at the Hollywood Test. They interviewed the Pranksters and took pictures and said they were going to do a big spread on the acid scene and, they hoped, put the Pranksters on the cover. So they hailed the bus on over to a big photo studio and Schiller convened them all. ThenâBabbs refused to go in. But the rest of them, Norman, Hagen, Cassady, a whole flock of them, went on in, and Schiller took a lot of pictures. To Norman it seemed square. For one thing, the guy was working in black and white, and the most obvious thing about the Pranksters was color, Day-Glo, the brighter the better, the more vibrations the better. Then Schiller had them all sit down in a group, against a black background, and in the middle they had Cassady stand up and wave his arms up and down like a crow. He took the pictures in strobe, and this would make Cassady look like he had multi-arms, like the great god Shiva. This strobe thing was at the time new in psychedelic photography, and the mass media would never tire of it. Recreates the acid experience, etc. Then Schiller told certain people to stay around for individual shots, colorful characters like Cassady, and Paul Foster with his wild mutton chops and Importancy Coat, and Norman, maybe because he had a beard. The usual ⦠The others went on outside where Babbs was. Finally they all left, the ones who had stayed for the individual shots, and when they got outside, the bus was gone. Clean gone. Babbs, Mountain Girl, Zonker, Walker, and the othersâsplit.
Life
magazine turned up, led by a photographer, Larry Schiller, who was on to the LSD world and had taken the pictures at the Hollywood Test. They interviewed the Pranksters and took pictures and said they were going to do a big spread on the acid scene and, they hoped, put the Pranksters on the cover. So they hailed the bus on over to a big photo studio and Schiller convened them all. ThenâBabbs refused to go in. But the rest of them, Norman, Hagen, Cassady, a whole flock of them, went on in, and Schiller took a lot of pictures. To Norman it seemed square. For one thing, the guy was working in black and white, and the most obvious thing about the Pranksters was color, Day-Glo, the brighter the better, the more vibrations the better. Then Schiller had them all sit down in a group, against a black background, and in the middle they had Cassady stand up and wave his arms up and down like a crow. He took the pictures in strobe, and this would make Cassady look like he had multi-arms, like the great god Shiva. This strobe thing was at the time new in psychedelic photography, and the mass media would never tire of it. Recreates the acid experience, etc. Then Schiller told certain people to stay around for individual shots, colorful characters like Cassady, and Paul Foster with his wild mutton chops and Importancy Coat, and Norman, maybe because he had a beard. The usual ⦠The others went on outside where Babbs was. Finally they all left, the ones who had stayed for the individual shots, and when they got outside, the bus was gone. Clean gone. Babbs, Mountain Girl, Zonker, Walker, and the othersâsplit.
Hagen couldn't believe it. “Whyâwe've been
pranked!”
he said.
pranked!”
he said.
Prankstersâand the Pranked.
Things being like they were to begin with, the prank took on fundamental meaning. Those who got pranked finally made
their way back to the moldering Sans Souci, and Babbs & Co. had cleared out of there, too, taking all the money and the food. Babbs left word that they, the inner nucleus, were going off to hold a Test of their own and would rejoin the Satellites for the UCLA Acid Test, scheduled for March 19. “The great idea still kept us together”âand Norman, Cassady, Hagen, Paul Foster, Roy Seburn, Marge and a couple others made a stab at preparing for the UCLA Test. But UCLA backed out of the deal because of the notoriety after the Watts Test, and that did it. All began drifting off. It was a strange time and a strange feeling. Nobody could figure why Babbs had pranked Cassady; the others maybeâalthough that Hagen would get pranked was pretty strange, tooâbut Cassadyâthat was unbelievable.
their way back to the moldering Sans Souci, and Babbs & Co. had cleared out of there, too, taking all the money and the food. Babbs left word that they, the inner nucleus, were going off to hold a Test of their own and would rejoin the Satellites for the UCLA Acid Test, scheduled for March 19. “The great idea still kept us together”âand Norman, Cassady, Hagen, Paul Foster, Roy Seburn, Marge and a couple others made a stab at preparing for the UCLA Test. But UCLA backed out of the deal because of the notoriety after the Watts Test, and that did it. All began drifting off. It was a strange time and a strange feeling. Nobody could figure why Babbs had pranked Cassady; the others maybeâalthough that Hagen would get pranked was pretty strange, tooâbut Cassadyâthat was unbelievable.
Cassady said fuck it and headed for San Francisco. Norman and Paul Foster went to stay at Hugh Romney's. Then by and by Norman got a chance to go to New York with Marge the Barge and Evan Engber, so they headed east by car.
“HARDLY HAD LEO LEFT US, WHEN FAITH AND CONCORD amongst us was at an end; it was as if the life-blood of our group flowed away from an invisible wound.”
One day Paul Foster cranked up the great God Rotor and sat down and worked on a very intricate illuminated billhead. When he got through, there was an ornate black border, and in the middle the words
IN MEMORIAM
in florid Old English lettering, and at the bottom: January 23, 1966, the day Kesey disappeared. Nothing else, just
In Memoriam
and the date. He hung it up on the wall.
In Memoriam
and the date. He hung it up on the wall.
The Fugitive
H
AUL ASS, KESEY. MOVE.
SCRAM. SPLIT FLEE HIDE VANISH DISINTEGRATE.
Like
run.
AUL ASS, KESEY. MOVE.
SCRAM. SPLIT FLEE HIDE VANISH DISINTEGRATE.
Like
run.
Rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrevrevrevrevrevrevrevrevrevrev or are we gonna have just a late Mexican re-run of the scene on the rooftop in San Francisco and sit here with the motor spinning and watch with fascination while the cops they climb up once again to
come git you
â
come git you
â
THEY JUST OPENED THE DOOR DOWN BELOW, ROTOR ROOTER, SO YOU HAVE MAYBE 45 SECONDS ASSUMING THEY BE SLOW AND SNEAKY AND SURE ABOUT IT
Kesey sits in a little upper room in the last house down the beach, $80 a month, on paradise-blue Bandarias Bay, in Puerto Vallarta, on the west coast of Mexico, state of Jalisco, one step from the floppy green fronds of the jungle, wherein flourish lush steamy baboon lusts of paranoiaâKesey sits in this little rickety upper room with his elbow on a table and his forearm standing up perpendicular and in the palm of his hand a little mirror, so
that his forearm and the mirror are like a big rear-view mirror stanchion on the side of a truck and thus he can look out the window and see them but they can't see himâ
that his forearm and the mirror are like a big rear-view mirror stanchion on the side of a truck and thus he can look out the window and see them but they can't see himâ
COME ON, MAN, DO YOU NEED A COPY OF THE SCRIPT TO SEE HOW THIS MOVIE GOES? YOU HAVE MAYBE 40 SECONDS LEFT BEFORE THEY COME GET YOU
âa Volkswagen has been cruising up and down the street for no earthly reason at all, except that they are obviously working with the fake telephone linesmen outside the window who whistleâ
THERE THEY GO AGAIN
âwhistle in the slow-brain brown Mexican huarache day-laborer way, for no earthly reason except that they are obviously synched in, finked in, with the Volkswagen. Now a tan sedan comes along the street, minus a license plate but plus a stenciled white numberâ
exactly like a prison stencil
âpolice and two coatless guys inside, both in white shirts so they're not prisonersâ
exactly like a prison stencil
âpolice and two coatless guys inside, both in white shirts so they're not prisonersâ
ONE TURNED LOOKED BACK!
IF YOU WERE WATCHING ALL THIS ON A MOVIE SCREEN YOU KNOW WHAT YOUR REACTION WOULD BE THROUGH A MOUTHFUL OF POPCORN FROM THE THIRD ROW: “WHAT MORE DO YOU NEED, YOU DOLT! SCREAM OUTTA THERE ⦔
âBut he has just hooked down five dexedrines and the old motor is spinning and rushing most nice and euphorically in fascination and a man can't depart this nice $80-a-month snug harbor on paradise-blue Bandarias Bay just yet with a cool creek of speed rush in his veins. It is such a tiny little fink scene as he sees it in the hand mirror. He can tilt it and see his own face entropied with the strain and then tilt itâa sign!âa sparrow, fat and sleek, dives through the dwindling sun into a hole in one of the lampposts; home.
MORE TELEFONO TRUCKS! TWO LOUD WHISTLES THIS TIMEâFOR NO EARTHLY REASON EXCEPT TO COME GIT YOU. YOU HAVE MAYBE 35 SECONDS LEFT
âKesey has Cornel Wilde Running Jacket ready hanging on the wall, a jungle-jim corduroy jacket stashed with fishing line, a
knife, money, DDT, tablet, ball-points, flashlight, and grass. Has it timed by test runs that he can be out the window, down through a hole in the roof below, down a drain pipe, over a wall and into thickest jungle in 45 secondsâwell, only 35 seconds left, but head start is all that's needed, with the element of surprise. Besides, it's so fascinating to be here in subastral projection with the cool rushing dex, synched into
their
minds and his own, in al its surges and tributaries and convolutions, turning it this way and that and rationalizing the situation for the 100th time in split seconds, such as: If they have that many men already here, the phony telephone men, the cops in the tan car, the cops in the Volkswagen, what are they waiting for? why haven't they crashed right in through the rotten doors of this Rat buildingâBut he gets the signal even before he finishes the question:
knife, money, DDT, tablet, ball-points, flashlight, and grass. Has it timed by test runs that he can be out the window, down through a hole in the roof below, down a drain pipe, over a wall and into thickest jungle in 45 secondsâwell, only 35 seconds left, but head start is all that's needed, with the element of surprise. Besides, it's so fascinating to be here in subastral projection with the cool rushing dex, synched into
their
minds and his own, in al its surges and tributaries and convolutions, turning it this way and that and rationalizing the situation for the 100th time in split seconds, such as: If they have that many men already here, the phony telephone men, the cops in the tan car, the cops in the Volkswagen, what are they waiting for? why haven't they crashed right in through the rotten doors of this Rat buildingâBut he gets the signal even before he finishes the question:
WAITING! THEY KNOW THEY'VE GOT YOU, FOOL, HAVE KNOWN FOR WEEKS. BUT THEY'RE CERTAIN YOU'RE CONNECTED WITH ALL THE LSD BEING SMUGGLED UP FROM MEXICO AND THEY WANT TO TAKE IN AS BIG A HAUL AS POSSIBLE WHEN THEY FINALLY SLAM IT. LIKE LEARY; THEY MUST HAVE BEEN WATCHING A DREADFUL LONG TIME BEFORE THEY WERE CONTENT THEY HAD SOMETHING WORTH HIS SIZE. THIRTY YEARS. FOR A HARVARD DOCTOR WITH GRASS. THAT'S HOW BAD THEY WANTED THE WHOLE BUSINESS LOCKED AWAY. THAT'S HOW DANGEROUS THEY CONSIDER THE WHOLE BUSINESS. AND THEY WERE COMPLETELY CORRECTâIF NOT IN THEIR FANTASY, THEN AT LEAST IN THEIR EVALUATION OF THE PRESENT AND EVER-GROWING PSYCHEDELIC THREAT
A NOISE DOWN BELOW.
THEM?
30 SEGUNDOS LEFT?
âmaybe it's Black Maria, come back with good things for eating and stuff for the new disguise, Steve Lamb, mild-mannered reporter and all-around creepâ
RUN, FOOL!
âShhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. Such a quiet secret muffled smile will be on Black Maria's face.
Rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrevrevrevrevrevrevrevrevrevrev It could have been all so quiet, just him and Zonker and the smoldering Black Maria in this $80-a-month paradise-blue Bandarias Bay in Puerto Vallarta. If the suicide ruse and the rest of the main Fugitive fantasy had but worked.
The trip into Mexico was easy, because everything with Boise was easy. Boise always
knew
. They picked up Zonker in L.A., and then Jim Fish, and they coasted on over the line at Tijuana. No hassle to cross over into Mexico. The border at Tijuana is like a huge superhighway toll station, a huge concrete apron and ten or fifteen customs booths in a row for all the cars pouring over into Tijuana from San Diego and points north, all plastic green and concrete like part of suburban superhighway America. So they rolled on over the line with Kesey hidden in the back of Boise's old panel truck and heart don't even thump too bad. Spirits up, a little of the Prankster élan back in the cosmos. In true Prankster fashion they spent one third their money stash on a Madman Muntz autostereo rig to go along with all the other valuables, like tape recorders and many tapes.
knew
. They picked up Zonker in L.A., and then Jim Fish, and they coasted on over the line at Tijuana. No hassle to cross over into Mexico. The border at Tijuana is like a huge superhighway toll station, a huge concrete apron and ten or fifteen customs booths in a row for all the cars pouring over into Tijuana from San Diego and points north, all plastic green and concrete like part of suburban superhighway America. So they rolled on over the line with Kesey hidden in the back of Boise's old panel truck and heart don't even thump too bad. Spirits up, a little of the Prankster élan back in the cosmos. In true Prankster fashion they spent one third their money stash on a Madman Muntz autostereo rig to go along with all the other valuables, like tape recorders and many tapes.
The next likely hassle is visas, because this shapes up as a long stay. Might be hot to try to get Kesey one in Tijuana, because Tijuana is just a California annex, really, the slums of San Diego, and they just might very well know about the case.
“We'll do it in Sonoita, man,” says Boise. “They don't give a shit there. Put down a couple of bucks and they can't see anything else.”
Sonoita is almost due east of Tijuana, just south of the Arizona border. Kesey uses his good shuck ID there and all is jake in Sonoita. Fugitive!âreal-life and for sure now.
Then south down so-called Route 2 and so-called Route 15, bouncing and grinding along through the brown dust and scrawny chickens and animal dung brown dust fumes of western Mexico, towns of Coyote, Caborca, Santa Ana, Querobabi, Cornelio, El Oasis, hee, Hermosillo, hah, Pocitos Casas, Cieneguito, Guaymas, Camaxtli, Mixcoatl, Tlazolteotl, Quetzalcoatl, Huitzilopochtli,
Tezcatlipoca haunting the Dairy Queen Rat Queen crossroads in the guise of a Rat, a Popoluactli-screeing rat, Tetzcotl, Yaotl, Titlacahuan he whose slaves we are, Ochpaniiztl priesty Angel-freaked out in a motorcycle made from the vaseline skin of Gang Bang Girl Meets White Trash ⦠A confetti of skulls and death in western Mexico, the Rat lands. Not one inch of it is picturesque burros and shawls or nova Zapata hats or color-TV pink chunks of watermelon or water lilies or gold feathers or long eyelashes or high combs or tortillas and tacos and chili powder or fluty camote vendors or muletas or toreros or olés or mariachi bands or water lilies or blood of the dahlia or tinny cantinas or scrapes or movie black marias with shiny black hair and steaming little high round pubescent bottoms. None of the old Mexico we know and love on the 21-day excursion fare. Just the boogering brown dust and bloated rat corpses by the road, goats, cows, chickens with all four feet up in the air at the Tezcatlipocan skull rot crossroads of Mexico.
Tezcatlipoca haunting the Dairy Queen Rat Queen crossroads in the guise of a Rat, a Popoluactli-screeing rat, Tetzcotl, Yaotl, Titlacahuan he whose slaves we are, Ochpaniiztl priesty Angel-freaked out in a motorcycle made from the vaseline skin of Gang Bang Girl Meets White Trash ⦠A confetti of skulls and death in western Mexico, the Rat lands. Not one inch of it is picturesque burros and shawls or nova Zapata hats or color-TV pink chunks of watermelon or water lilies or gold feathers or long eyelashes or high combs or tortillas and tacos and chili powder or fluty camote vendors or muletas or toreros or olés or mariachi bands or water lilies or blood of the dahlia or tinny cantinas or scrapes or movie black marias with shiny black hair and steaming little high round pubescent bottoms. None of the old Mexico we know and love on the 21-day excursion fare. Just the boogering brown dust and bloated rat corpses by the road, goats, cows, chickens with all four feet up in the air at the Tezcatlipocan skull rot crossroads of Mexico.
To Kesey it was a hopeless flea-bitten desert he was fleeing into. But Boise made it bearable. Boise always
knew.
Boise was wizened and thin-faced and he had the awfulest New England high flat whine, and he didn't belong anywhere near here, but he was
here, now,
and he
knew
. The truck breaks down for the fourteenth timeâ
knew.
Boise was wizened and thin-faced and he had the awfulest New England high flat whine, and he didn't belong anywhere near here, but he was
here, now,
and he
knew
. The truck breaks down for the fourteenth timeâ
“No hassle, man. We just back it up on a rock, man ⦠Then we just take the tire off and fix it.”
More flat, Rat country, mosquito and flea, into total nothing, like the lines of perspective in a surrealist painting, but Boise makes you realize it is all the same, here as anywhere. Boise lecherously scanning the streets as they bounce through the dead chicken towns just like it was only Saturday night on Broadway in North Beach, spotting a good looking gringa muchacha padding along the side of the road with honest calves,
25 SECONDS LEFT, FOOL!
and he says, “Shall we get her over and
ball
her, man?” all in the
same New England whine, as if he were saying, Wanna Coke, or not? Kesey looks at Boise's lined face and his thin lips, looks ancient, only a glitter comes out of the eyes, nice and lecherous, dead certain and crazy alive at the same time. And Boise in that moment is in the tiny knot of Perfect Pranksters, the inner circle, ascending into the
sangha
for good.
ball
her, man?” all in the
same New England whine, as if he were saying, Wanna Coke, or not? Kesey looks at Boise's lined face and his thin lips, looks ancient, only a glitter comes out of the eyes, nice and lecherous, dead certain and crazy alive at the same time. And Boise in that moment is in the tiny knot of Perfect Pranksters, the inner circle, ascending into the
sangha
for good.
In Guaymas, on the gulf, Jim Fish wants out.
An early attack of paranoia, Jim Fish?
and catches a bus back to the U.S., leaving Kesey, Boise and Zonker and the equipment. But was it not ever so? You're either on the bus or off the bus. Kesey's spirits were picking up. Boise was pulling everything together ::: this crazy New Englander is
here
in these Rat lands.
An early attack of paranoia, Jim Fish?
and catches a bus back to the U.S., leaving Kesey, Boise and Zonker and the equipment. But was it not ever so? You're either on the bus or off the bus. Kesey's spirits were picking up. Boise was pulling everything together ::: this crazy New Englander is
here
in these Rat lands.
“Hey, man ⦔ Boise points at a construction scene they're going by. “ â¦
see that?”
as if to say, There's the whole thing, right there.
see that?”
as if to say, There's the whole thing, right there.
A whole gang of workmen are trying to put the stucco on the ceiling of a building they're finishing up. One fat man is mixing up the stucco in a washtub. One skinny one is scooping the stucco up out of the tub with a little trowel and pitching it up underhanded at the ceiling. A little of it sticksâand three or four guys stand on a plank scaffolding taking stabs at smoothing it outâbut most of it falls down on the floor and three or four more are hunkered down there scraping it up off the floor and shoveling it back in the tub and the skinny guy skinnies up another little gob with his skinny trowel and they all stare again to see what happens. They are all hunkering around in huaraches, worthless flat Rat woven sandals, up on the scaffolding, down on the floor, waiting to see what happens, how fate brings it off with this little gob of nothing pitched up at the Rat expanse â¦
And it's all thereâthe whole Mexico Tripâ
“They have a saying, âHay tiempâ'” Boise hooks the steering wheel to get around an ice-cream vendor in the middle of the road “ââo,' âThere is time.'”
20 SECONDS, IDIOT!
Huaraches, which are
the
Rat shoe. It all synches. Mexico is the Rat paradise. But of course! It is not worthlessâit is perfection. It is as if the Rat things of all the Rat lands of America, all the drive-ins, mobile-home parks, Dairy Queens, superettes, Sunset Strips, auto-accessory stores, septic-tank developments, souvenir shops, snack bars, lay-away furniture stores, Daveniter living rooms, hot-plate hotels, bus-station paperback racks, luncheonette in-the-booth jukebox slots, raw-concrete service-station toilets with a head of urine in the bowl, Greyhound bus toilettes with paper towels and vomit hanging over the hockeypuckblack rim, Army-Navy stores with Bikini Kodpiece Briefs for men, Super Giant racks with matching green twill shirts and balloon-bottom pants for honest toilers, $8,000 bungalows with plastic accordion-folding partitions and the baby asleep in there in a foldaway crib of plastic net, picnic tables with the benches built onto them used in the dining room, Jonni-Trot Bar-B-Q sandwiches with a carbonated fruit drink, aluminum slat awnings, aluminum sidings, lukewarm coffee-“with” in a china mug with a pale brown pool in the saucer and a few ashes, a spade counter chef scraping a short-order grill with a chalky Kitchy-Brik and he won't take your order till he's through, a first-come-first-serve doctor's waiting room with modest charwomen with their dresses stuck on the seats of shiny vinyl chairs and they won't move to get loose for fear you'll look up their dress, plaid car coats from Sears and a canvas cap with a bill, synthetic dresses for waitresses looking like milky cellophane, Rat cones, Rat sodas, Rat meat-salad sandwiches, Rat cheezis, Ratburgersâit is as if the Rat things of all the Rat lands of America had been looking for their country, their Canaan, their Is-ra-el, and they found it in Mexico. It has its own Rat aesthetic. It's hulking beautiful â¦
the
Rat shoe. It all synches. Mexico is the Rat paradise. But of course! It is not worthlessâit is perfection. It is as if the Rat things of all the Rat lands of America, all the drive-ins, mobile-home parks, Dairy Queens, superettes, Sunset Strips, auto-accessory stores, septic-tank developments, souvenir shops, snack bars, lay-away furniture stores, Daveniter living rooms, hot-plate hotels, bus-station paperback racks, luncheonette in-the-booth jukebox slots, raw-concrete service-station toilets with a head of urine in the bowl, Greyhound bus toilettes with paper towels and vomit hanging over the hockeypuckblack rim, Army-Navy stores with Bikini Kodpiece Briefs for men, Super Giant racks with matching green twill shirts and balloon-bottom pants for honest toilers, $8,000 bungalows with plastic accordion-folding partitions and the baby asleep in there in a foldaway crib of plastic net, picnic tables with the benches built onto them used in the dining room, Jonni-Trot Bar-B-Q sandwiches with a carbonated fruit drink, aluminum slat awnings, aluminum sidings, lukewarm coffee-“with” in a china mug with a pale brown pool in the saucer and a few ashes, a spade counter chef scraping a short-order grill with a chalky Kitchy-Brik and he won't take your order till he's through, a first-come-first-serve doctor's waiting room with modest charwomen with their dresses stuck on the seats of shiny vinyl chairs and they won't move to get loose for fear you'll look up their dress, plaid car coats from Sears and a canvas cap with a bill, synthetic dresses for waitresses looking like milky cellophane, Rat cones, Rat sodas, Rat meat-salad sandwiches, Rat cheezis, Ratburgersâit is as if the Rat things of all the Rat lands of America had been looking for their country, their Canaan, their Is-ra-el, and they found it in Mexico. It has its own Rat aesthetic. It's hulking beautiful â¦
Then they reached Mazatlan, the first full-fledged resort you reach on the west coast of Mexico, coming down from the States. Everybody's trip was fishing in Mazatlan. Along the old Avenida
del Mar and the Paseo Claussen, white walls with nice artistic Rat fishing scenes and hotel archways with great shiny blue marlins hanging inside the arches and gringos with duckbill caps here to catch some marlin. Mariachi music at last, with the trumpets always breaking and dropping off the note and then struggling up again. Zonker has the bright idea of going to O'Brien's Bar, on the beach front, place he got beat up out back of once by thirteen Mexican fags. Zonker enjoys revisiting scenes of previous debacles.
Like also spends hours on the beach telling them how his true and fiercest fear is of being attacked by a shark while swimming ⦠as he picks flea-bite scabs until his legs stream blood to the luscious world ⦠then goes swimming.
del Mar and the Paseo Claussen, white walls with nice artistic Rat fishing scenes and hotel archways with great shiny blue marlins hanging inside the arches and gringos with duckbill caps here to catch some marlin. Mariachi music at last, with the trumpets always breaking and dropping off the note and then struggling up again. Zonker has the bright idea of going to O'Brien's Bar, on the beach front, place he got beat up out back of once by thirteen Mexican fags. Zonker enjoys revisiting scenes of previous debacles.
Like also spends hours on the beach telling them how his true and fiercest fear is of being attacked by a shark while swimming ⦠as he picks flea-bite scabs until his legs stream blood to the luscious world ⦠then goes swimming.
Other books
Hannah's Blessing by Collette Scott
Futile Efforts by Piccirilli, Tom
Sleepover Girls Go Wild! by Ginny Deals
Lilith’s Dream: A Tale of the Vampire Life by Whitley Strieber
The Ambushers by Donald Hamilton
Witch Silver by Anne Forbes
Lady of the Lake by Elizabeth Mayne
Jo Beverley - [Malloren 03] by Something Wicked
This Fierce Splendor by Iris Johansen
Crystal Tomb (Starfire Angels: Dark Angel Chronicles Book 3) by Melanie Nilles