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I Am Big Red Deadhead by Bill Walton

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Fun read.

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Strange Trips: I Am Big Red Deadhead

By Bill Walton

The most fabulous thing about the Grateful Dead was how they weren’t afraid to make a mistake and their ability to experiment and change your life by trying something new. Our world is somehow sadly evolving into a culture of obedience where we can’t finance health care or education, and can only finance war.

I would constantly harass Jerry and tell him to play this song or play that song, and finally Jerry would say something like, "You know Bill, I don’t really like that song. I don’t like the message that that song sings."

What I hear when I listen to a lot of the music that’s out there today is rampant with negativity, violence, sexism, excessive waste and greed. The Dead were about peace, love and happiness. People would go to the show and have the greatest time of their lives. It’s sad that we’re not doing that anymore.

Sessions

When I was in high school, about 40 years ago, air travel was just in its infancy and there was a startup airline in California called Pacific Southwest Airlines. For $20 you could buy a weekend pass and fly anywhere in the system all weekend long.

I lived in San Diego and the Grateful Dead were in San Francisco, so my friends and I would get on the planes and go wherever the Dead were going. The stewardesses in those days wore hot pants and miniskirts, served free drinks and never checked ID. We were sixteen and having the times of our lives.

It continued on when I was in college; the Dead would come every year. The basketball team would be practicing in the afternoon as the trucks were coming in. I never had to leave the building. It was so awesome.

The band would leave after the show and in the morning the team came back in for practice. I had been in there all night and was on fire. I’ve never played better basketball. Coach Wooden would come in and ask, “What is this thickness in the air?â€

One of my favorite memories happened one day while playing for my beloved Boston Celtics, the team who not only gave me my career back but also my life. At practice I was warming up on the side and Larry Bird and Kevin McHale come over, corner me and say “What’s going on here? There are all kinds of people with long hair and funny t-shirts and they smell bad. Are the Grateful Dead coming to town?â€

I said, "Yes they are, and in fact, most of them are already here." They asked if they could come to the show, so I went outside and asked the band if the Celtics could come. I told the guys that these Celtics are icons and can’t really go out in public.

They said, "Bill, no problem we’ll take care of it." So the team meets at Larry Bird’s house. Everybody came except for Danny Ainge whose wife wouldn’t let him come. Larry arranges this fleet of limousines to be out in front of his house.

Once we’re backstage at the Worcester Centrum, I started introducing everybody. Larry this is Jerry, Mickey this is Chief, Kevin this is Phil, and all the way down the line. Once it was time to start the show the crew led us to this cornered off area right on the stage that they built for us. It was perfect, nobody could see us.

For those of you who have not been to a Dead show, it’s the most unbelievable sense of anticipation, excitement and exhilaration. Waiting for the band to start gets your skin crawling, everyone around is jumping up and down and thinking this is going to be the greatest night of our lives. This was not one of these staged acts where a guy comes out and lip syncs recorded music, these guys are actually tuning up and making sure the instruments are right.

The Celtics had never been to one of these shows. I’ve been to about 650, and that’s just not nearly enough. Jerry steps up into the shaft of light, the golden light, it was put up so perfectly. He’d always do this even though it was always right, he’d walk up and touch his lips to the microphone and kick the foot pedals a little bit to make sure everything was just perfect.

That night in the Worcester, right after he checked everything, he looked over into that enclave where we were sitting and made eye contact with Larry Bird and gave him a big wink. Then he mouthed to him: “Larry, this is what we doâ€. Then he turned back to the audience and blew it out for six hours.

Once the show was over, the band races off the stage and all these Celtics guys’ eyes are just kaleidoscopes. They all asked if they could come back tomorrow and they did came back, many times. Not just with me but on their own too.

The very next day Mickey, Bobby and Jerry came to practice with the Celtics. Mickey was trying to play one on one with Kevin McHale, Bobby was with Dennis Johnson trying to shoot jumpers, and Jerry, god bless him, comes in with a black leather jacket, purple T-shirt and dark sunglasses. He’s just there leaning on the wall, who knows if he was asleep or not.

Larry Bird used to love to run around the court dribbling the ball before we would start scrimmaging. Larry, as he’s coming around the court, passes by Jerry three or four times. Finally, from 20-feet away Larry takes the ball with his left hand (and without touching it with his right hand) and rips a behind the back pass as hard as he could right at Jerry. The ball hits the wall and just barely misses his head. Jerry never even flinched. Mickey saw this, jumped on Larry’s back and started screaming, “Don’t you ever do that again!†We had some really good times.

Aiko! Aiko!

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