Woodstock, NY.

Remember, there are decent people out there. Everywhere, or it would never work. 

When I was a kid, and we lived in Woodstock, upstate New York, I remember a woman called Lynne – her house had burned down. Now Woodstock is a small town but like a lot of places of that type – it was a close, caring community.

Lynne had been made homeless in the morning of the day I’m writing about – by the evening two of Woodstock’s musicians – John Sebastian and Paul Butterfield had organised a concert in the town hall. Sebastian played with the Lovin’ Spoonful and had recently been number one in the US charts with ‘Welcome Back’ – a theme tune to a John Travolta tv series. Both John Sebastian and Paul Butterfield had played at the Woodstock festival in Bethel in 1969.

All this was before Live Aid. About 50 people all showed up at the town hall that night and the guys put on a show. You donated what you had or could afford, and that money went to helping Lynne be re-housed.

I’ll always remember that. Most people are okay. 

bobby stevenson 2020

3000 Miles of Heaven to Woodstock

They had first gone there when the world was a more complicated place, and their lives were just plain and simple. Everything they wanted or needed seemed easier to get back then.

They had married in a small church in Big Indian, a town snuggled in the beautiful Catskill Mountains. When Tony had suggested that they go on a honeymoon, he had been thinking more of the Poconos - not the journey that Helen had suggested: to ride a Trailways’ bus from New York, to Chicago and then on to Los Angeles.

This was the 1970s, and cheap flights were a thing for future times. As for going by train, well the American rail system had seen better days. So the bus seemed the best solution - it was cheap, even if it was going to take them three days – not that it mattered, they were on honeymoon. That was enough.

They had managed to have forty-eight glorious hours on the West coast before it was time to return. They had sat on the beach on their second night there and promised themselves they would return one day. No matter what.

Within a week of them arriving back home, Tony was on his way to Vietnam. It had been the reason they had married so soon and so quickly. Tony had picked a low number in the college draft and was told to report for training immediately.

There were no two ways about it – war had changed Tony as it had for many young men and women over the years. Tony had seen and felt many things that would stay unreported in a lonely area of his brain, only to be taken out and re-lived when Helen was fast asleep and he could shed a few quiet tears.

He had seen buddies, ones who had told Tony of the lives they were going to have when they got back to Philly, or San Fran or a million other towns and cities, and yet Tony had seen many of those guys return in body bags.

So one night before they faced the Vietcong in a final push upstream, Tony promised himself that if he managed to make it back home, then he and Helen would move out West and make a life there.
And they had.

Tony had got employment with a big computer company, and it had given them a comfortable life in California. They had raised three kids, two girls and a boy, and each of them had married and had given Tony and Helen a total of ten grandchildren.

Their boy had joined the army and had been stationed overseas. The two girls had moved to the north, one to San Jose, and the other to Sacramento.

When the doctor told Helen about the spread of the disease, he had advised her to put all those important things in her life, in order. One was to tell Tony – something that had taken her almost seven days to get around to doing. Helen felt that there would be life before the illness and life after – and when the story came out nothing would ever be the same again.

Tony didn’t cry when he heard the news; instead he just picked up the basketball that would always lie out in the yard and he shot a few hoops. When Helen took to her bed that evening, he went to the chair on the back porch – one he kept for all the private thoughts in his head – and he wept – he cried for Helen, for his buddies, and in some ways for himself.

In the morning, he tried to shine as bright as the California sun, but for those who knew Tony, they would have seen that his eyes were a little duller.

They spent the next couple of days living as if the news had never broken between the two of them, but every time Helen looked away at something, Tony would try and drink in her face, and smell and laughter, and try to keep them locked in his head for the cold days that lay ahead when she would no longer be around.

It was on the following Saturday that Tony suggested they have another honeymoon and asked Helen where they should go.
“Home,” she said.
“But you are home,” Tony had replied.
“No, back to the Catskills. I want to watch the sun going down behind Overlook Mountain,” then she smiled at him and his heart broke.

She didn’t want to fly, the trains were still troublesome, and she felt that maybe the bus would be too difficult to ride, what with her illness and all. So she suggested they drive back home along the route the Trailways bus had taken them to LA all those years before.

“We can just take our time,” she told Tony.  They both knew she wasn’t coming back from the Catskills - that would be the end of the road.

Tony closed up their home - he would decide what to do with it later, that kind of thinking was for another time.

Helen packed all the clothes she needed and by the Monday morning they set off to drive from Los Angeles to Las Vegas. Tony got them a room in one of the smartest hotels in Vegas and that night, Helen went down and gambled for the first and last time in her life. She started with a hundred bucks and by the time she had played cards and roulette, she was three hundred dollars up. She put a hundred bucks in a charity box and with the two hundred other, she bought a couple of bottles of good champagne. She and Tony sat by the window the whole night and watched the sun come up over the desert. Neither of them spoke, they just drank and watched the wonders of the world, and then fell asleep.

In the old days, the bus would have gone straight to Cedar City, but instead, Helen asked Tony to take her on a detour to Flagstaff and then on to the Grand Canyon. It had always been on her bucket list and what with the kids and her job, they had never found the time.

The sight was breathtaking – literally – she almost choked at the wonder of the Canyon, then Helen took a deep intake of air and shouted, ‘I love you, Tony with all my heart and soul’ at the top of her voice. A couple next to them applauded her and she smiled back.

It was another day or so before they made Salt Lake City. They checked into a motel and then went for a walk. On Sycamore Avenue, Helen led Tony by the hand to one of those burger joints. It had been years since she had taken the kids to one of those places. Helen and Tony had the biggest burgers with fries and cheese, and when they finished, Helen cleared away the trash and hopped up on the table. She asked Tony to join her – and when they were both on the top, she started to dance and Tony quickly joined in.

“I’ve seen it in the movies,” she told Tony. “And I always wanted to do it.”
On the morning they crossed into Wyoming, the sky was azure blue and the wind was fresh. It was one of those days when Helen wanted to hold on to life until the end of time, itself.

In Laramie, Tony arranged for Helen and him to go riding. She’d been on horses as a kid but had lost her way somewhere down the line. It was the greatest feeling in the world, riding horseback and she and Tony felt like they were very first cowboys. Why had she left it so long?

In Cheyenne, they had gone skinny dipping in the motel pool and when the manager told them there had been complaints, Helen walked naked from the pool back to her room. In the room, Helen and Tony laughed until their sides were almost bursting.

A couple of days later they made Omaha, Nebraska, and at the bar, that evening, the two of them pretended that they were strangers to each other, ones who had just met for the very first time. A tall man with a strange eye tried to pick up Helen that night, which flattered her and annoyed Tony – a little.

They reached the Windy City, Chicago, a day or so later. Helen wanted to go to the top of the Sears Tower, but the following morning she was so ill that Tony had taken her to hospital.

She wasn’t getting any better and the doctor advised her to take several days rest, and then to fly back to New York. That night Helen asked Tony to take her out of the hospital (regardless of the doctors). So Tony dressed up in a white coat, put Helen in a wheelchair, and pushed her right out of the building. The two of them felt like kids again.

They drove around Lake Eire. It had always been a special place for Helen as a child. On vacation, her grandparents and parents would rent a little cabin near the lake. She asked Tony to drive her to the cabin, but it wasn’t there anymore, it had been replaced by a large hotel and some cheap-looking houses.

They stayed the night in the hotel which was someway between Cleveland and Eire, and she sat watching the dawn while Tony was still asleep. It was the same view she had sat watching in her grandmother’s arms all those years before. 

She didn’t feel so good but kept it hidden all through breakfast. It was just as they were heading into New York State that she asked Tony to hurry the journey up. She felt that there wasn’t so much time.

When they drove through the woods of the Catskills, she let out a sigh. She had been waiting for years to exhale this way.  Helen rolled down the window and breathed in a large fix of her cherished mountain air.

This was the place that had made her, and this was the land that would see her at rest. She had made it at last.
She was home.

bobby stevenson 2020

Two Dylan/Woodstock Stories

1.Me,Jack,Bob and the Bike

For my mum and for Woodstock, the only place I remember her being truly happy (and where she got to enter Dylan’s house).

What this story really needs is the truth, but I ain’t sure if anyone knows what that is anymore. So I’ll tell you what I know and the way it happened – or at least the way I remember it.

That summer of 1966, I was working over in Poughkeepsie, on the other side of the Hudson. There was a computer factory over there who were offering contract work at a real good rate. I would have been stupid not to take it.

I was living in Kingston on the west side of the river, in a small apartment in the downtown area. The reason I was trying to save some money was that my cousin, Jack was heading over this way from England and we were both heading for Canada.

He loved his soccer, and besides England was in the final of the soccer World Cup, which was being held in London the day after we left. We hoped to be in Ontario for the game where he planned to meet with some our family and friends.

I finished up work and headed down to Kennedy (or Idlewild as we used to call it) to pick up my cousin. Man, he was pumping and was up for this trip just as much as I was. Our plan was to go up through Woodstock on the Route 28 and then on to a little place called Liverpool, just north of Syracuse. There we were picking up more friends and we hoped to be in Hamilton, Ontario by the morning.

The soccer match was on early over here, so we thought that driving through the night would see us right. I had never seen a real honest to goodness soccer match, never mind one that was being shown around the world.

We started out real early on the morning of July 29th, and I told Jack that I wanted to stop in Woodstock and pick up some money that I was owed. Steve lived on the Glasco Turnpike and it wasn’t going to be too much of a delay, besides I needed the cash.

Steve wasn’t in when I called, but he had left the notes in a little package stuck to his door (Woodstock was, and still is, that kind of place).

I turned my VW around in Steve’s front yard as I planned to head out in the other direction and stop for a coffee in Phoenicia. It was going to be a long drive to Syracuse.

We had probably only traveled about a quarter-mile when we saw this guy sitting by the side of the road. My cousin recognized the bike as a Triumph Tiger – he knew about these things better than me. So I’m thinking to myself, you can’t let someone sit by the road, I mean you just got to stop and help. That’s the way it is in this fine land.

I could see by the skid marks that he’d slid off his bike and landed on the grass. Jack jumped out quickly and ran over to the guy to see how badly he was hurt.

He’d been lucky. There was only a few scrapes and bruises and considering that he was wearing nothing but jeans and a t-shirt, I would say that the good lord wasn’t looking for him that day.
I said we’d take him to hospital but he wasn’t having any of it. He said he just wanted to go home and maybe we could slip the bike in the back of the VW.

It seemed like the right thing to do, and since he only lived out towards Bearsville, it wasn’t going to take us too far out of our way.I took a left into Striebel Road and he said we should drop him there. I got to say, he looked real uptight, like he was ready to cry or something. I asked him if, maybe, we should take him home.He told us to stop the VW, as he wanted a little air. I asked if I could walk with him and he said he sure, if you want.

He told me he had a manager around these parts. That he was a singer – it was then I realized that he was Dylan, although I didn’t say anything – and that he’d taken the bike from his manager’s garage and hadn’t bother to check the thing.

“I guess them tires weren’t ready for the roads.”
He asked us where we were going and I told him north, then into Canada.
“Hey! You guys looking for a passenger?”

I couldn’t see any reason why not. So me, Jack, Bob and the Bike all traveled through the back waters of New York State towards Syracuse. We stopped just before 3 at a little diner. We all had a beer, fries and some burgers.

I had to ask why he was coming with us and he said,
“Cause, he wasn’t going with them. They’re leeches, man, leeches.”

I guess when a man has had enough, he has had enough.
We told him we were picking up some folks from Liverpool and he asked if maybe, it could just stay us. So I said, okay and telephoned the family and said we’d broken down. Some real bad story anyways.

We’d got to Buffalo and that was when Bob said, that he didn’t have no ID, and that we’d have to smuggle him into Canada. This is the weird thing, here we are trying to get into another country and we’ve got Bob Dylan hiding under the coats in the back.

I don’t know what God was watching us that day but we managed it. We made Hamilton about midnight and we booked into a motel rather than going to the folks.

We never did get to see them. We told Bob about the England – Germany soccer match and he said, we could go to a bar in town and see it. Just in case, he wore some shades, which kind of looked weird in downtown Hamilton.

And that folks, is what we did. Me, Jack and Bob (who supported Germany – well he’s a Zimmerman after all) all watched England beat West Germany 4 goals to 2.

The following morning Bob had checked out the hotel before we got up.
We never saw him again. We read that due to a motorcycle crash on July 29th, 1966 – he had been injured and had to get fixed up for several months.

I reckon he was tired of the leeches, that’s all.



2.Albert,Bob and Climie

The sun was sinking low behind Overlook as he set out to walk back to Woodstock.
He’d spent the day helping Joshua over in Bearsville’s fixing some pipe or other. Didn’t matter what it was, it was money and that’s all that mattered.

Like all the roads in the Catskills, there’s no sidewalk, so you just kept yourself alive by jumping from side to side. It was probably best to do it drunk, that way you didn’t worry.
Climie was humming some Bluegrass tune and trying to pretend that the coming dark wasn’t making him a little crazy. Some of those guys just sped out-of-town as if the cops were chasing them. I mean, they couldn’t see anyone, especially a kid in a dirty old pair of dungarees heading home.

He lived in Glasco road just past where The Family lived; a kind of house that took in all lost souls who found their way to it.

He would always run past The Family on account of all the stories he’d heard, but truth be told they were just folks like himself who needed a little hand to get back up, standing.
Climie must have been on the edge of Tinker Street when an old wagon slowed down. Now either it was someone lost, or someone he knew, or someone wanting something that he wasn’t prepared to hand over.

“Heading into town?” The driver asked.
Climie nodded and said nothing.
“Wanna ride?”

Did he know this guy? Climie was sure he’d seen the guy’s face around. He still had to get through town and out the other side to hit the Glasco road. So he thought what the hell and jumped in the wagon.

Climie looked at the man.
“Something bothering you man?” Asked the driver.
“Do I know you?” Said Climie.
“Does anyone, know anyone,” was the man’s reply and then he gave a little giggle.
“Sure I do, you sometimes talk to that red-Indian guy who sits on the store’s steps, where the Trailways bus pulls in. Ain’t you him?”
“He ain’t no red-Indian,” said the man. ”But he’s my good friend.”
“You live here?” Climie asked him.
“Does anyone really live anywhere?” said the man.
Climie looked at him as if he might be just a chord or two short of a tune.
“I can see it in your eyes, you think I’m crazy, don’t you?”

Climie dropped his face.
“That’s all I needed to know. I ain’t crazy, I’m just me.”
“So what do you do?” Climie asked.
“I am, what some people would call, a troubadour.”
“A whatma dour?”
“I sing songs for a livin’,” then the man grinned.
“Over at the Woodstock pub?”
“Not for a long time,” said the man. “Not for a long, long time.”
“So where you sing now?”
“Just about anywhere on this old rock. Anywhere they’ll have me.”
“You any good?” Asked Climie.
“I survive, where are you heading?”
“Glasco.”
“Been there long?”

Climie shook his head and told how they had to come down from Buffalo on account of his mom getting a job looking after one of Woodstock’s writers.

“Well I’ll be, I know your mom. Sweet little thing with bright blonde hair.”
Climie smiled, ‘cause that’s how he would have described his mom, too.

“You at school?” Asked the man.
“Onteora.”
“Over in Boiceville,” added the man. “Sure I know it.”

Then the man slowed the wagon down at the bottom of Glasco road.
“Going to drop you here, young ‘un, on account I got to visit my friend – or as you call him the red-Indian. If you see him sitting on the steps again, just say ‘Hi’. His name’s Albert and mine’s Bob.”

And with that Climie was out of the cab and running up Glasco and pleased that he hadn’t had to pass The Family.

bobby stevenson 2016