1971, it was the summer of drugs. In a small semi rural town called Sunland/Tujunga Merril Graves discovers life through hallucinogenics and the horrors of the mind....
The old Merc chugged down the hill towards Sunland, my friends and I waiting for the effects to begin. It was already dark and the street lights reflected off the cracks in the windshield in a delight of colors and dancing trails of wonder. I was sitting shotgun, Steve in the back with Dale at the wheel. The unreality began to soak in. We were slowly being drawn into a universe all our own, the ether of magic and childlike wonder connecting us in a slow whirlwind of perception, not unlike a dream.
It felt as if the car was just floating above the road, a combination old jalopy and extraterrestrial magic carpet ride. Dale and I looked at each other and just giggled like kids that just stole a pie out of Mom's window.
"So, are ya coming on to it yet?"
I just nodded my head and grinned so hard the muscles in my face began to hurt.
"Wow!" Said Steve in the back seat.
" What, what are you wowing about?" I asked while turning to look in the back seat. There was Stevey with his hands clasped to the back of the seat, his pale oval face staring out the windshield, eyes as big as silver dollars, black as night, without a trace of the brown that was normally there.
"The street looks like a river, like a purple river!"
I turned back to look and saw what he was talking about . Apparently, in the time it took me to turn and look at Steve, then turning around to look out the windshield again, it had started to rain.
"WHOOOOOAH !," Came from my face.
"Dude it's raining!" I reached over and gave Dale a nudge.
He looked down at my hand like he had never really seen a hand before and just started laughing, he then looked up at me and I saw that his pale blue eyes were as black as Steves. He looked back out the windshield, did a quick steering correction because we had drifted a little into the other lane, laughed again and said.
"When the fuck did that happen?"
We all just sort of wondered that to ourselves but didn't have an answer. Dale reached down and turned on his wipers and we all went ,
" WHOOOOOOOAH !" in harmony
As the wipers removed the water from the windshield it was like we had stepped through a door into the fifth dimension. Clearly now, you could see the purple river that was once Foothill Blvd. as our intergalactic rattletrap adventurer became a sort of boat. The sound of the rain on the roof, sans headliner, added to the sound as if we were cutting through the waves, the car began to rise and fall as if on a boat to Catalina, putt putt putt. The trails the wipers left on the windshield were creating an effect like, a photograph was being taken with each wipe and somehow they were swish-swashing in time with Burton Cummings singing,"No sugar tonight in my coffee, no sugar tonight in my tea, no sugar to stand beside me, no sugar to run with me. Da doo da dow da doo dow, da doo dada da da!"
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