by Andrew Moisey
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I've got a good story to tell you about my Rolling Stones ticket-purchasing experience. The people you meet here are very special. Okay, so I got up at 9:30 Sunday morning, which I must remind you comes directly after Saturday night. My alarm woke me up well and instead of eating, showering, or even dressing properly, I trusted my instincts to get in line in a hurry and waited in my pajamas. Much to piss me off, the line for the tickets had already wrapped around two sides of the block. However, my spirits were raised when one of the fifty-year-olds in from of me announced that some cool dude was handing out lottery tickets which would eventually change everyone's order in line. Unfortunately, the guy ran out of tickets RIGHT AS HE GOT TO ME. Jesus Christ. With no explanation as to my chances of receiving tickets, he purposely avoided any eye contact and hurried away from the jeers of mine and the lotteryless Stones fans behind me. "Don't worry, kid," this raggedy-looking dude beside me said, "I've been to a lot of shows, and they usually open multiple shows when there are this many fans." This guy was the only dude who has ever owned or at least chosen to wear Everlast sneakers. He had on some very dirty sweat pants, an even dirtier sweatshirt, and some cheesy 7-11 sunglasses resting atop his long gray mass of hair, kind of Paul McCartney looking. Knowing that I was going to be in line with this guy for awhile, I began the conversation: "So, who've you seen?" This guy is no joke. "Well, I've seen the Stones every year they've toured...jeez man, I've seen everybody. Like who ya askin' about?" Not a difficult question to answer. "You seen Zeppelin?" "Oh, yeah. Ya know, the reason we gotta figure out where the hell to buy seats in the goddamn Collosium is because of Zeppelin. I was at this one concert in Golden Gate Park where Zeppelin was playin', 'cause that's where they used to have all the concerts, right? Well, ya know how they've got the Medical School like six blocks away?" "No, but go on." "Well, let me tell you that Zeppelin played so loud that they were disturbing the medical equipment there. Six blocks away! I mean, people were on life support!" (You can guess my facial expression at this point). Now, this guy had already made my day right there. He could've never said another word and I would have gladly taken that conversation to my grave. But, lo and behold, he continued... "Yeah, I've seen a lotta concerts here in the Bay area. Lotta good bands comin' outta Berkeley High." "Like who?" (Rolls off a bunch of names I've never heard of, one of which was Digital Underground, who I have heard of.) "Yeah, I taught most of them." "You mean, you taught the guys in these bands? Like how to play?" "No, I taught them history. I was a teacher at Berkeley High in the early eighties." "Really?" "Yeah, like there were a few of these freshman once that were trying to form a band. And since I've been around music for awhile, I said I'd be their manager. They had this unbelievable drummer too, this real Keith Moon. I think he's with (someone I've never heard of). The only problem was, they didn't have a lead singer. So I was their lead singer. Yeah, we'd go out and play gigs all over the place. Good music, too. I never assigned them homework when we were scheduled to play. Woulda been too hard on them. And me, too." This is not normal, obviously. "So, why did you stop teaching?" I was expecting him to say that he was like fired for doing this or something. "I stopped teaching in...let's see...1987?" Seemingly dodging the question, I asked him again. "Oh, why? Well, I was offered a teaching job at the University here." Of course. "Yeah, for the Fall semester I taught the history of Latin America from like, you know, the cave man days to 1880. And then in the Spring I taught US foreign policy in Latin America from 1880 until the present." "You don't teach anymore?" "No, I got real involved in like political activism and stuff. Like when Reagan was slaugtering all the Costa Ricans and the Nicaraguans, I was protesting on Sproul Plaza (where all the protests are). It was like taking up too much of my time to teach. And when the Iraqis invaded Kuwait, I was in charge of writing up a peace settlement and sending it to the White House." Yes, just like I was. He went on and on for about another hour about the causes of the Gulf War. "So what are you doing today?" "You mean job wise?" "Yeah, I guess." "Well, I'm still involved in the same sort of stuff." "What are you working on now?" "You been following the pepper spray stuff?" (There has been a big to-do here about banning the use of pepper spray by police, which I haven't really been watching closely, since I don't plan on being pepper sprayed anytime soon. But now this dude was prepared to shed some light on it for me.) "Well, I've been working with that. It's been very, very difficult. I respect the police department here. I talked with the police chief the other day about it and he told me a lot of stuff about how it allows officers to better subdue large criminals without using clubs. Well, the truth is, over seventy people have died nationwide from reation to pepper spray, for reasons the cops simply cannot tell from appearance. (And he goes on and on about this, too.) "Now, have you ever been pepper sprayed?" he asked me. "No, never." "Really?" "Yeah." "Clubbed?" "No." "Maced?" "No." "Well," he said, "I've been pepper sprayed. I've been maced, and I've been beaten with a club, and you know what?" How in the world do you react to a statement like that? "What?" I asked. "I'd take being pepper sprayed over any of them, but that's just me. I know I don't have asthma or anything that pepper spray could react with and kill me. But the cops don't know that." "Uh, right," I sort of replied. "So what else have you done?" "Well, I was a major proponent for 215." If you're not familiar with California politics, Proposition 215 can be translated into layman's terms as the bill that legalized marijuana for medicinal purposes. He started to tell me about the reasons why marijuana should be legal, an argument which hinges surprisingly and surprisingly well on the overcrowding of prisons. If you want to know more about why marijuana should be legal, just e-mail me and I will explain. So, after his lecture, I asked him the question. "Do you ever think marijuana will be legal?" "Well," he said, "as far as I'm concerned it is, at least here in Berkeley. Like, just the other week I was riding in the car with my girlfriend, and I had this bottle of wine right? Well, it wasn't opened, but I guess the cop saw me pass her the bottle, so whadda you know? Here come the flashers! And I pull over and this young cop comes over and takes a big deep breath like he's the rooster and looks at my car, which has alla these Dead stickers on it and is in like this beaten up condition, and says, 'Is there any marijuana in your car, sir?' And so I say, 'Officer, you might find a bud in here or a stem or a leaf or so, I don't know. You may even find a matchbox of mushrooms in here. The truth is, I've been doin' that stuff for thirty years, Officer, so you could find anything.' So he says, 'okay, just throw it all out down the road, okay?' I guess that he knows he's not going to change me at all and just let me go. And I was speeding too." "That was nice of him." "Yeah, I guess." "So, how did you get involved with the pepper spray issue and stuff?" "Well, I've been serving four years as the City of Berkeley's Peace and Justice Commisioner." Sure he is! Why not! "So," I said, "you're a city councilman!?" "Oh, no! I'm not a city councilman! I was APPOINTED by city council!" Only in Berkeley. And I have his business card to prove it. Since we were in line together for four and a half hours, we covered a lot of stuff, and he wants to hang out sometime. He's a pretty big hockey fan and he wants to watch the Flyers-Rangers hockey game with him if it's on ESPN (he's a big Rangers fan). He's also interested in some of my Zeppelin stuff, so I'm sure I'll see him again. At least I will at the concert- we got seats right next to each other. The people you meet here in the street are unbelievable. Speaking of the street, you should've seen the fight the other night. This one dude hits this other dude in the mouth so hard the guy flies backward about five feet. So this lady pops up out of nowhere and pulls out a butcher knife like a foot long and three inches thick! She starts chasing this dude down the street, wielding her sword and screaming, "You kill my baby! My baby! I'm gonna kill you!" Don't let anyone tell you the nightlife here in Berkeley is a bore. |
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