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Strange memories on this nervous night in Las Vegas. Five years later? Six? It seems like a lifetime, or at least a Main Era - the kind of peak that never comes again.

San Francisco in the middle '60s was a very special time and place to be a part of. Maybe it meant something. Maybe not, in the long run . . . but no explanation, no mix of words or music or memories can touch that sense of knowing that you were there and alive in that corner of time and the world. Whatever it meant . . .

History is hard to know, because of all the hired bullshit, but even without being sure of "history" it seems entirely reasonable to think that every now and then, the energy of a whole generation comes to a head in a long fine flash, for reasons that nobody really understands at the time - and which never explain, in retrospect, what actually happened.

There was madness in any direction, at any hour. If not across the Bay, then up the Golden Gate or down 101 to Los Altos or La Honda . . . You could strike sparks anywhere. There was a fantastic universal sense that whatever we were doing was right, that we were winning . . .

And that, I think, was the handle - that sense of inevitable victory over the forces of Old and Evil. Not in any mean or military sense; we didn't need that. Our energy would simply prevail. There was no point in fighting - on our side or theirs. We had all the momentum; we were riding the crest of a high and beautiful wave . . .

So now, less than five years later, you can go up on a steep hill in Las Vegas and look west, and with the right kind of eyes you can almost see the high-water mark - that place where the wave finally broke and rolled back.

Rest in peace, finally, Mr. Duke.

In your memory, Bacon and Hap and Xena's Guy and I will check into a Las Vegas hotel under phony names with intent to commit capital fraud and heads full of acid.

"And that, I think, was the handle - that sense of inevitable victory over the forces of Old and Evil. Not in any mean or military sense; we didn't need that. Our energy would simply prevail. There was no point in fighting - on our side or theirs. We had all the momentum; we were riding the crest of a high and beautiful wave . . ."

How special........the victory over those forces had been won with the blood and sacrifice of young, patriotic military conscripts...allowing the vagabonds of the sixties to enjoy their hedonistic pleasures. The children of the 90's are reaping that self indulgent whirlwind.

Thanks very much Hunter S***T

The best passage he ever wrote. Captures the end of the 60s, and what happened when a bunch of idealistic stoned people ran into the real world, and their wave broke. I guess there really is no one tending the light at the end of the tunnel. The world is a much less interesting place now that hotels no longer need to fear HST.