“Box of Rain” smells like the backseat of my mom’s old Passat. She likes to claim that my brother and I knew all the words to the Grateful Dead track when we were toddlers. So began my indoctrination into the world of the Dead.
In 1974, back when my mom was 11 and still known only as Christine, she made a new friend at the Jersey Shore where she spent summers. Ralph was from Brooklyn and had his finger on the pulse at 13. He played her a live version of “Eyes of the World” and she was hooked. They became penpals and swapped music recommendations by mail.
A few summers later in 1977, my grandparents finally let her hitch a ride to the Philadelphia Spectrum for her first Dead show. She was 15 and would go on to spend her teenage years catching the band around venues in the northeast, from the Spectrum to the Nassau Coliseum. When she went to college, it was at CU Boulder, a short drive to Red Rocks, but once you’re that far west — and that far gone— places like Alpine Valley and Oakland aren’t too far, either. If the Dead were playing and she could get a ride, she’d be there.
You’re likely picturing my mom as some kind of poster child Deadhead: You probably see her twirling, tripping, blissed beyond belief. The popular conception of Deadheads as latter day hippies or burnouts is very much at odds with my mom, a hardworking, single-parenting, lawyering, business-owning powerhouse who worked tirelessly to keep our family on track. Her dark flared jeans, heeled boots, and stylish leather bags put her at odds with many of the tie-dyed, palo santo-burning Haight-Ashbury elders (and posers) who will populate the Dead & Company’s Golden Gate Park shows, and yet, my mom is attending all three nights. Deadheads come in all shapes and sizes.
Here are some lessons I learned from my mom, the Deadhead.
Lesson 1: Art before profit
Nevermind the Steal Your Face bumper stickers, the perfectly worn farm shirts in the closet, or the box of live tapes in the attic: For my mom, the Dead was, and remains, all about the music and the fun. Thousands of shows, no two the same, she’d tell us. Thirteen studio albums and innumerable live recordings in circulation. A gaggle of brilliant musicians helmed by the talented, troubled Jerry Garcia with a compulsive drive to write, play, and tour. The band’s other lore — a Kesey-adjacent entourage, iconography recognized the world over, the thousands of followers — were all due to the music.
Following the gluttonous Live Nation/Ticketmaster merger, she tsk-tsked scalpers who marked up art for profit, and artists who cashed in themselves. “You used to buy tickets directly from the Dead,” she said during a recent chat about the Golden Gate shows. “They cut out the middle man to keep the prices down.” That, and the band’s sanctioned recording section, were evoked like folktales throughout my childhood to communicate a message: Be real, and be generous. There is always enough to go around.
Lesson 2: Live a little (or a lot)
My mom is, by all accounts, one of the highest-functioning and most disciplined people I’ve ever met. And yet, she’s also one of the most fun-loving. We were pulled out of school to hit the slopes. We’d squeeze every last minute of summer out of the Jersey Shore and arrive at Catholic school with sand in our scalps. She’d get us up early just to cruise the freshly waxed floors of Target in our Heelys.
These adventures turned me into someone who isn’t afraid to go the extra mile (or 20) for what I love. Her embrace of the Dead and eagerness to travel whenever and wherever to see them inspired me. Now, whenever I’m weighing plans, I can hear her voice in my head: “Do it. Live a little.”
Lesson 3: Embrace change
When Dead & Company was ramping up in 2015, I assumed, given Mom’s highly attuned ear, that she’d want nothing to do with John Mayer covering Jerry’s beloved songs.
But, per her review, Mayer holds it down well. He does not attempt to be Jerry, nor does it feel like his show at all. His talent on the guitar is beyond debate, and you can tell he’s done his homework. If a purist who experienced some of the Dead’s absolute best shows can find merit in Dead & Co., that’s good enough for me. It’s also a reminder to be open to new things. Even if they’re John Mayer.
Lesson 4: Count your blessings
Last summer, Mom took me to see Dead & Co. at the Las Vegas Sphere, our fifth show together. The Mayer-co-designed visuals on the wraparound screen began with the Grateful Dead house at 710 Ashbury and zoomed out, slowly, above all of San Francisco. I couldn’t help but long for a city — and time — that I never knew. I felt such awe for this place.
Jerry, Janis, and so many others may be dead and San Francisco may operate under a very different vibe, but if I crane my neck around the AI billboards and robotaxis, I still see the free spirits. They might not be able to afford a flat on Haight St., but I see the artists, some as troubled as they are talented, much like those during the heyday of the San Francisco scene.
I can see the freaks, many as fabulous as the ones in the footage of the Dead’s 1968 Haight Street concert. Hell, when I see the Golden Gate Bridge, I’m reminded anew that despite the beigeification of life in our algorithmic age, we live in a brilliant, colorful city that both creates and is created by extraordinary people.
Lesson 5: Love your mother
It’s so easy for me to love the Dead, if not for their music then simply for my mom. It’s such an easy joy to accompany her to these Dead & Co. shows and to share a little of the magic she’s talked about my entire life. It’s a privilege to see Bob Weir and Mickey Hart — musicians who will be remembered for generations — onstage together, as they were 60 years ago.
I don’t think about their ages. I don’t think about the exorbitant VIP packages and silly merch. I think about my mom when she was my age stomping around SF between New Years shows at the Kaiser Auditorium and how lucky I am to be in the same city doing the same thing this upcoming weekend. And, best of all, with her!
Among Deadheads, to be given a free ticket into the show is to be “miracled.” I count my blessings every day that my mom “miracled” me into this beautiful thing nurtured in this amazing place.
