Seminole

 

Seminole

     This was a place of daydreams, pot smoke, yarn spinning and mind altering music. I had graduated from college in the Summer of 1970 and bummed around for a few months just wanting to be a hippy, However,  pressure from home forced me to accept a job as a salesman of scientific equipments and chemicals for Van Waters and Rogers aka VWR Scientific. After a couple of paychecks I rented a cozy back house on Seminole ave. in Gate-adjacent Lynwood. Rent was 60 bucks.  This being one of the few parents-free zones it was a gathering point for young pals wanting to smoke, drink and talk about how they were not getting any girls. Greg visited Seminole almost every night and we sat, smoked and listened to music on my Morse stereo while figuring out a life where we knew all the answers. The Morse was a terrible, department store clearance console my Dad bought out of some guys car trunk but it played the records we loved, just not very well. The only TV in the house was a tiny portable with a six inch screen that I almost never watched with company. It was just talking and music at Seminole. I was so delighted with the place the second week on the job I had to call in sick from a vicious hangover caused by celebrating with Greg and Tim about our friendships.  I could write an entire book on these short two years on Seminole but many of the tape titles seen here were rehearsed or created within those humble walls. It was a half-block from the thrift store Value Village where I bought most of my clothes and decorations, including my furnture. I actually still have a chair I paid $1.95 for at the Village where I sit 54 years later. Greg never wore used clothes or jeans or t-shirts but he sure as hell sat and smoked him some weed in those easy chairs at Seminole. The Seminole tape title was based on the songs we listened to at the little house. Some of them we left back in the 1970's but on the rotation included Spirit, Steve Miller Band, Yes, Brewer and Shipley, Cat Stevens, Gordon Lightfoot, Joni, the Who, the Doors, Judy Collins, Zappa, Hot Tuna, Leo Kottke and of course the four lads from Liverpool. Seminole cemented two of the most precious friendships in my life because it was here Greg and Tim were constant and wonderful companions. Ironically, the place was practically across the street from where Disa grew up and while Tim dreamed of a soul-mate she was not far from where he sat. Memories were made that never faded all that much.