That's the part of it that is so devastating. The vibe is this "hey everyone share and be friendly to each other" and then you go back to your tent and someone has stolen literally everything from it - they "shared" it from you.
Then you say "oh well that was just one time, the crowd here is cool" and then shit like that keeps happening and at some point you just realize "Oh, that's what this crowd is REALLY about!"
You get lulled into this sense of well being, maybe it's the pot, I dunno. I never went to a Dead show, I was an adult while they were still touring, it just never really landed on my radar as something to do. The phish thing for me was coincidental, I made some friends in a new town where I knew no one and they happened to be into it and I kinda got into it through them, but I was always kind of outside looking in. I was never a long hair dirty hippie type. Occasionally kids in the lot would mumble "Five-O" when I walked by because I was a little older and had short hair and didn't dress like a shithead. Honestly I only ever kinda liked the music.
But hippies are hippies and so many of them are people living on the outskirts of society, don't work and just sort of float around as long as they can without having to really work or commit to much. There's plenty of people who are just regular folk or college kids that go to the shows and have fun, some of them even have "long hair" but I wouldn't actually call those guys "hippies". Those regular folks, sure they're cool.
That's the part of it that is so devastating. The vibe is this "hey everyone share and be friendly to each other" and then you go back to your tent and someone has stolen literally everything from it - they "shared" it from you.
Then you say "oh well that was just one time, the crowd here is cool" and then shit like that keeps happening and at some point you just realize "Oh, that's what this crowd is REALLY about!"
You get lulled into this sense of well being, maybe it's the pot, I dunno. I never went to a Dead show, I was an adult while they were still touring, it just never really landed on my radar as something to do. The phish thing for me was coincidental, I made some friends in a new town where I knew no one and they happened to be into it and I kinda got into it through them, but I was always kind of outside looking in. I was never a long hair dirty hippie type. Occasionally kids in the lot would mumble "Five-O" when I walked by because I was a little older and had short hair and didn't dress like a shithead. Honestly I only ever kinda liked the music.
But hippies are hippies and so many of them are people living on the outskirts of society, don't work and just sort of float around as long as they can without having to really work or commit to much. There's plenty of people who are just regular folk or college kids that go to the shows and have fun, some of them even have "long hair" but I wouldn't actually call those guys "hippies". Those regular folks, sure they're cool.