There's Nothing in this World Worse than a Wet Hippie. An Experiment in Gonzo Journalism.

By BF Ulrich

A Gonzo-style report from an outsider living in a hippie environment at the peak of the hippie movement.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BF Ulrich
• Release date: Feb 7, 2013
• ISBN: 9781301799060

BF Ulrich

BFUlrich is a professional engineer who lives in Nevada.

Book preview

There’s nothing in this world worse than a wet hippie

An Experiment in Gonzo Journalism

Bryan Ulrich

Copyright 2013 by Bryan Ulrich

Smashwords Edition

****

Part 1

A thunderhead loomed just to the west of us. We were sitting in the city park in Sedona, Arizona, watching a free concert by a local band called Sock Puppet Soldiers. They were punk before anybody knew there was punk. Or possibly their guitarist only knew two cords. It was 1967. It was hard to tell the difference, and who cared, anyway. Punk wasn’t even a thing yet. They were angry and with a message. They were singing a song called Peace Don’t Hurt. The finale was spectacular. A crack of lightning lit up at a tree next to the makeshift stage. It arced across to the stage and lit up the guitarist, who convulsed and backed into the drum set. The drum set exploded in a ball of flames, catching the bass player’s pants on fire. The bass player madly circled the singer, and eventually tripped the singer with his electrical cord. It was utter chaos. Sweet and utter chaos. Some poor sap in a blue jacket jumped on stage and began knocking everyone down, rolling on top of them. Maybe it was a cop. The next thing you know, most of the audience was up on stage, rolling around. You can just never tell what’s going to happen at a punk concert. Just then the heavens opened up and the rain fell like all hell broke loose. At least the fires were out.

In case it never occurred to you, you should know that there’s nothing in this world worse than a wet hippie. Everything we owned was immediately drenched. Except for the contents of Stubby’s knapsack. God’s manna. Weed. And not the local crap either. This is the good shit from California. His whole goddamn knapsack was crammed full of this shit. Between the ten of us, we don’t have two cents, but somehow Stubby always maintains a full supply of weed. God bless Stubby. Bastard probably stole his old man’s credit card.

From head to toe we were drenched, and so was everything we owned, which was at our campsite up by Flagstaff. Beautiful spot in the woods. Some people would call it a commune. We called it camping. It wasn’t a real campground. Probably somebody’s property. Slowly we made our way back to the camp. A family drove passed us in a station wagon. Talk about opposites colliding. The driver tossed their trash out the window as they passed us. Do you think anybody would pick up ten drenched hippies hitchhiking on the highway? No chance. Stubby kept sticking his thumb out anyway. Dumbass. A pair of bikers drove passed us going the other way, both on choppers. I flashed them a peace sign. They flashed me the bird. Dig that shit.

Besides having no money, we also had no personal hygiene effects. Not a razor or bar of soap among us. I forgot to mention that I am by far the oldest among us. Twenty-nine. Christ. Don’t trust anybody over thirty. Christ, dammit, I was almost there and these bastards seemed to know it. Doesn’t help that I looked like I was 60 when I was 12. Dammit. Anyway, I was saying, we were soaking wet, and none of us had bathed for who knows how long. As soon as we started to dry out we’d make a serious stink. At least we lived outdoors. I’m not very good at being a hippie. Probably too old for it. It was an experiment for me. Had to see if I liked it, which