The summer sun bled sweat from my 5-year-old forehead as I watched my parents rally a crowd of disparaged farm workers.  “Down with the Shah,” boomed through the streets and bobbing papier machee heads of Jimmy Carter were shred apart and lit into flame.  My half black brother and I watched silently, taking refuge in the shade of a guitar amplifier where my parents gave voice to the disappointment and rage of the thousands of protesters gathered in Golden Gate Park.   It was San Francisco in the 70’s.  My parents worked with the Black Panthers, the S.F. Mime Troup and the Revolutionary Communist Party.  There were strikes, demonstrations, violent confrontations with police, and a belief in change that motored a musical movement since unparalleled.  My earliest memories are of my mother’s propaganda artwork; Mao Tse Tung silk screened in red and yellow and of my father’s calloused hands and warehouse work boots.  They believed their songs would change the world from the outside in.  They believed in revolution. It never happened.

With broken family and broken hope, my father left to chase rock and roll dreams and my mother pled insanity, making relocating her new cause.  My mother, brother and I traveled yearly from city to field, coast to concrete, pumping the welfare system like well oiled pistons of a charging 16 wheeler.  Weekends were spent in clubs with taxi driver/activist/musician dad, and the week was spent with Miles Davis recordings, incense, flamenco dancers, Carl Jung and artist/rebel/student mom.  By seven I was quoting Mae West, had Barbara Streisand’s album, “Guilty” memorized, had attended Clash concerts, and seen Willie Nelson regularly with my Hell’s Angels neighbors.

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