Living Off The Grid

As the weeks and weeks of COVID-19 have worn on, I’ve found myself reflecting on life before zoom, smartphones, and social media; really life before the internet became a cultural norm, say pre-1995. I’d go back to that time in a heartbeat. I miss anonymity, the unknown, the ability to reflect and savor those moments. Anonymity in my present life equates to not having an Instagram account or using Twitter. It once meant I could disappear for days and just be with myself. No expectations to check text messages, email, or post pictures of what I was doing for anyone to see. However, as challenging as these past few months have been, the silver-lining for me has been the pause it has allowed – even with the ubiquitous zoom meetings. And while there’s a part of me that has become so engrained in feeling that I must always be working and producing, my motivation has also sheltered - in a place I can’t seem to find, and I’m fine with that.

Instead, I’m relishing the opportunity to revisit – at least in my mind – the days when it was possible to live off the grid, when surveillance was a Humvee driving through the streets of Eugene, Oregon at night with thermal imaging to detect pot-growing. While significant and creepy at the time, it was nothing like our overwhelmingly accepted and embedded surveillance systems today that steal our identities as weapons of terror and tools for profit.

I lived in Eugene for 5 years, 1988 - 1992 and received my undergrad degree at the University of Oregon; though, I wasn’t really part of the college scene, other than many long nights in the printmaking studio. Mine was the alternative, underground ‘hippie’ community. And even that ranged vastly -- from other college students like me who were drawn to an alternative way of seeing the world and living, yet still had a toe in mainstream culture - to folks who were so completely off the grid, living under the radar and off the land, or in vehicles, and for the most part, undetected.

Nevada Nuclear Test Site Protest, Mercury, Nevada, 1991

My first introduction into this surreal world was working at the Butte Tavern, a seedy, blue collar (timber and mill workers), on the "wrong-side of the tracks" bar in south Eugene. The place was a large windowless cement box with two pool tables, dart boards (teams for both), and ‘Blues on Thursdays’. I REALLY needed a job and I saw an ad in the paper looking for a bartender. I went to apply.

It was around 7pm, I walked through the door and was hit with a cloud of cigarette smoke. A bunch of long-haired hippie biker types, including the two bartenders all turned and looked at me like I must be lost; an apt assessment as I was a young, wide-eyed college student dressed as if I were going to an interview for an upscale venue (I had no idea what the protocol should be). I walked up to the bar and asked if I could get an application. The bartender (Frank, or Frankie as he was dearly referred to -- he was a big hairy bear, though I didn't put that together for awhile) was clearly taken off guard, paused and then said "uhhhh sure" and went in the back and got one. I filled it out there and the next day Frankie called and said I had the job. Apparently the owner Dennis was sitting at the bar when all this went down and after I left he told Frank to hire me.

Soon, I was considered a special member of the fraternal order of blue-collar men who would gather every Monday through Friday at 3pm to drink beer and shoot the shit until dinner time. Frankie also started scheduling more music. We had bands on Thursdays (always stayed Blues night), Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays. Henry Vestine, guitarist from Mothers of Invention and Canned Heat fame, was a regular and Ken Kesey would occasionally hang out. 

This is also how I met my then boyfriend Dave Hicks, who is really the one responsible for my experiences in the bowels of living off the grid in Oregon. Dave was playing with the band, Band of People and needed a poster designed (I was starting to make band posters for the WoW Hall). We met at the Butte to discuss the design, he came over that night, we went to Cougar Hot Springs and then had a great, adventurous, tumultuous relationship for the next four years. In addition to the lure of the older guitar/mandolin player, Dave had been a nuclear physicist for 6 years, saved the big bucks he'd made (being extremely non-materialistic), realized how fucked up the industry was, and left it all behind to move to Eugene and pursue an alternative life and his real love of music.

L->R: 1) Me & Severin wearing our hats made by Alicia; 2) Jean, Dave, Dr. D, Chuck, & Mark at the Oregon Country Fair; 3) Alicia, Daisy, and Chuck at Jim Guthrie’s

One of my favorite stories from working at the Butte came after a closing night scare. I worked the closing shift for the first 8 months I was at the Butte (7pm - 3am), and alone during the week. This ended on a Sunday night after I announced I was closing and the three guys who had been there all night playing pool and getting wasted started to give me a hard time. I was getting nervous. Luckily by the grace of god, Dave, who lived a couple blocks away walked in at that moment to see if I wanted to come over. 

Mine was now the dayshift. And every day, like clockwork, at 2pm Harold would pedal in for his one can of Bud (my theory on 2pm was that Harold wanted to avoid the hubbub that would begin shortly after 3pm when the mill workers would file in). Harold looked to be in his sixties and had the appearance of someone who spent the first part of his day clawing his way out from 6 feet under (rusty bicycle in tow) just to ride over to the Butte for a beer. He'd sit at the bar, barely saying a word, nursing that can of Bud (Bud was the Butte Tavern's signature beer - of our 5 taps, 4 were Bud and Bud light, Bud in a can, Bud in a bottle, Bud signs everywhere), stay for an hour and pedal out.

One day the group of us who are there - me, Frankie, and a handful of regulars - see Harold coming from the street (during the day we'd keep both doors open as it was the only way we could tell that it was daytime). He was riding up on a spanking new turquoise Huffy mountain bike with a bell to boot, and he's ringing that bell as he rides in like there's no tomorrow. We're all speechless. Harold parks the bike in the corner and sits himself down at the bar, grinning ear to ear (I note that Harold actually has a lot less teeth than I had thought). So we have to ask: "Harold, what's up with that new bike you got there?" Harold says "I won myself $22,000 in the lottery." So we all congratulate him and gather round to hear about the big moment and ask what he's going to do with the cash and he tells us he gave $20,000 to his grandkids for college and is keeping the other $2,000 in the bank, less what he spent on his new bike. My Allman Brothers tape is playing and "Midnight Rider" comes on, when it gets to the chorus Harold stands up, toasts the air and belts out "and I got one more silver dollar ..."

Folks wonder where I got my bad-ass, bitchy attitude … look no further than being a bartender at the Butte Tavern and having to eighty-six members of the Hells Angels (and other bikers) on a regular basis. Though, keep in mind, it was all just part of the game - the next night they’d show up and we’d laugh and joke like nothing had happened; and they would threaten to beat the shit out of any newcomer who harassed me. Definitely one of the best jobs I ever had.

More on my off-the-grid trips in another post.