Richie And The Dark Days

It's times like these, the dark days, that I think about Richie. He's gone now, and I still miss him. But I remember the dark days way back when, and how he always gave us comfort.

Especially today, April 4th. Fifty-two years ago today they blew away Dr. King. It was the second day in my life for which I remember every second. The first had happened five years earlier, when President Kennedy bought it in Dallas. He was the only president I ever met and shook hands with, in Battery Park a few months before he died. He came there to dedicate the Navy monument to the sailors who died in World War II. He pulled up on the Esplanade in the same open-top limousine in which he would later die in Dallas, got out with just one Secret Service man and waded into the crowd shaking hands.

I was fourteen years old. I'd never shaken a president's hand, before or since.

But five years later, April 4, 1968. I was at a hockey playoff game in Madison Square Garden watching the Rangers trying for the Stanley Cup. The game ended, I don't remember who won, and we walked out into Penn Plaza and saw the vendors waving newspapers with Dr. King's photo on the front page, and the headline in Second Coming type (if you know newspapers you know that's the biggest font they have, reserved for when Jesus returns.)KING DEAD!

Richie (Havens) showed up at my college a few days later. He was friends with the woman who ran our student center. He hugged us all and said, "It's gonna be alright. We're gonna be alright."

God, we so needed to hear that.

I think of all the times since when he did that for us.

Like a few months later, when Bobbie Kennedy was killed in Los Angeles.

Like the Vietnam War.

Like Desert Storm.

Like September 11th....

The last time I saw Richie alive was at Highline Ballroom. His brother came to the show and sat with Jane and me. It was a great night.

The next time I saw him was at his wake, at City Winery. All us old hippies drank too much and sang all his songs.

Peace to you, Richie. Peace to you John, and Martin, and Bobbie

I hope someone lives long enough to wish peace to us.