Phish was just beginning to play outside Burlington. At the break I took my customary walk around the block and met Trey and Marley coming through the door. Trey asks, "you going home?" smiling, and I say, "no way, I'm staying," grinning like a schoolboy, which I wasn't, even then. But I knew I was witnessing the Rise, of which there may be no Fall.  That's another story...

Town was dead. It was not a weekend night, maybe not even a Thursday. I saw no moving vehicles when I was outside this bar, except one. And there were also no humans moving around outside, except one. I had just lit a twister, and this was uncharacteristic as I usually used a chambered bat with a wooden handle and a pinner hole at the other end for maximum shot-gun effect.

There was an alley-road behind the bar, and when I was half way round the local Law came around the corner and straight towards me. How far can you see a cigarette in the dark?...should I make a sharp right and ditch?.....He's driving soooo sloooowww.... I turned herb around into my closed hand, the hand closest to him. I kept my head up, looked straight ahead, and had to believe in my power to influence things to go the way I needed them to... that if just for this instant, I would have more power than the police.

Back in the safety of the bar, I took up a stool at the bar as the crowd had swollen to maybe 30 folks, including those who maybe worked at the school and don't even know that they saw Phish that night. Before the band took the stage, Fishman came up to bar and asked to see the duck. The bartender reached under the bar and brought up a quart mason jar filled with formaldehyde and a four-legged duckling. I examined that mason jar myself. It was real. Apparently it had lived for a short while. We were all tripped out.

This show was not advertised in the Burlington papers, but only in a insert paper in the Montpelier Times-Argus. It was one of the shows where Amy would come in, pumped up from a long drive from New Hampshire, maintaining that original phan status and dedication, even to this day. I have never seen this show listed anywhere.

This was fun. Future potentials could be Nectars, Amy's Farm, The Out Back, Pickin' Pickles, etc. Think Peace.

the other brian, Amy

Editor's Note: Am I the only one who hasn't seen the boys at a bar? Guess so...