Anyhow, we're about halfway to the city, yet still four hours or so from home, so we decide to get a room at the local Sleep Inn or Best Western or whatever it was, I have no idea. We get situated in the room, and i volunteer to go get water and ice for our beverages, among other things. As I'm leaving our room and making my way down the old hallway, i came upon a curious fellow. 

This fellow was pretty wild looking. He was tall like me, about 6'2", but then this fellow had an enormous brown 'fro on top of his head that made him appear nearly seven feet tall. His eyes had the same look in them that mine probably had. I got to talking to him, and he said he couldn't remember what room he was in. He had been walking up and down the corridor just staring at doors and kind of holding his head like maybe he could channel the right number out of his brain if he concentrated hard enough. 

I immediately ascertained that this kid was undoubtedly one of those characters you only encounter on the road, so i invited him back to our room. He said he was gonna keep looking for awhile. I wished him luck and made my way to get the ice and whatnot. When I came ambling back, this goofy kid was still looking pretty lost, so I told him to come back to our room and have a beer, which he did.

It was at this point that this curious shademaster introduced himself as Robbie and met my friends. We all had a beer, and before too long he was back on his way to look for the misplaced room. No big deal, people have random encounters like that on tour all the time.

ABOUT A MONTH LATER...

So about a month later I'm back at home in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and I'm at a local little club checking out this band called The Big Wu. I was impressed by The Wu and learned they were playing the next night at Bell's Brewery down in Kalamazoo. I decided then and there that I needed to see The Wu again immediately.

The next night it turns out none of my friends are down with going to KZoo, but I knew I had to see The Big Wu again. I decided to go regardless of my flaky friends, and this proved to be a wise decision. Almost instantly upon entering Bell's that night, I saw this kid who looked familiar in that unfamiliar kind of way. I knew that I must have seen him somewhere, but I had no idea where or when or under what circumstances. 

Slowly, this feeling started to drive me crazy, so I went up to the kid and introduced myself, which i would have been far less inclined to do if I was with a bunch of people already. So he told me he was Robbie and that he was temporarily staying in Michigan. We deduced that we'd both been to a bunch of the same Phish shows, including the Minneapolis->Chicago->Normal leg from fall tour a month prior. It was right about then that it hit me like a ton of bricks, as they say. 

This was the discombobulated kid from the hallway in Illinois! Of course, it was Robbie With The 'Fro, as my friends and I had christened him. That night Robbie With The 'Fro introduced me to some of his friends, and we had a wonderful time getting down to The Wu that night together. We all ended up going back to Grand Rapids, and I brought Robbie to a party where the other two kids that were in Normal with me were chilling out at. Needless to say, they were both shocked and highly amused when they saw old Robbie With The 'Fro again!

To make a long and winding story just a little bit shorter, Robbie hung out with our crew over the next month, where we really learned just exactly how much of a wild and wacky character this kid truly was. We capped it off partying in high style with Robbie With The 'Fro and another group of his friends in Detroit for the winter tour opener. After that experience, my group headed down to Cinci, and he left for his hometown, which was, of all places, Key West, Florida. We made plans to meet up in Ft. Lauderdale before the whole Big Cypress extravaganza.

On 12/29 Robbie picked us up in Ft. Lauderdale in his shady ass Dodge Shadow, and he was already in fine form. It became clear to me when we got halfway to Boca Raton that we were going the exact wrong way and that this was Robbie With The 'Fro in his natural element, and he was operating on an entirely different level all together than he had been up north. This was the southern Florida version 2.0 Robbie With The 'Fro, and he was completely and totally oblivious to his surroundings in the most joyful way i've ever witnessed. 

The line "tranquil and serene until he runs out of supplies" comes to mind. This kid was fairly barreling down the highway at 35 mph, puffing this gigantic bowl that he kept packing full of these crippie orange/purple funk nuggets, the likes of which i'd never seen before or since.  All the while he's swerving all over the place and cars are flying past us, honking horns and flipping birds while he looks for his friends in the rear view mirror, because at some point we lost them in the mix. 

I've got two more jars bulging with these buds under my seat, and at that moment Robbie With The 'Fro tells us he doesn't really have a license or insurance. Then he says, "i'm sorry guys." The way he said it was like, "yeah, well we definitely might get pulled over, and if we do we're fucked... i guess so i'm sorry if that happens." Needless to say, I kind of tensed up until we got to Alligator Alley, because all I wanted to do was get to this reservation without any run-ins with the authoritahs. Fourteen short hours later, we parked and set up camp.

The rest is Robbie With The 'Fro history. Big Cypress went off without a hitch, and Robbie With The 'Fro made one of the best runs I've ever seen an individual make. He was definitely one of those people who was so out there to begin with that mind-altering substances only spun him halfway back around to normal. He literally never stopped the whole time and consumed more of just about everything than the rest of us, yet he would just get down harder. And Robbie With The 'Fro had a wonderfully unique style of dancing, by the way. Facial contortions, flailing limbs, the whole nine.

At any rate, at the end of it all, he gave us a ride back to Ft. Lauderdale. It was 5 am on a Sunday morning, and everyone was faded. The good-bye's were quick, as he still had to get to Key West, but I knew as he pulled away in the early morning haze that I would never see this truly cosmic kid ever again. He was there for that moment in time around the turn of the century, and then just as quickly he was gone. It's now over two years later and I've yet to encounter him again.

So Robbie with The 'Fro if you ever read this, what's up bro? You made a lasting impression on my friends and I, and we'll never forget you. Take it easy kid, and be well.

- ryan riedy