Rewind Park

John Denver's Last Stand

The station entrance on the corner of Doherty Street and Sunset proved easy to find. It sat right out in the open, a large half-dome of metal and glass with wide stairs leading to the tracks below. 

I hung across the street and staked out the entrance for an hour or so, keeping an eye out for park rangers. The stairs belched a steady stream of tourists, smiling and pointing when they emerged from the underground like little kids walking down Disneyland's Main Street. The locals, however, walked by the station as if it didn't exist. They completely ignored it, as if they had some kind of mental block.

After I felt satisfied that no rangers were in the area, I darted across the street and down the shiny marble steps. 

I descended a series of staircases, weaving through tourists coming the other way. Posters on the walls advertised the shows playing that night on the Strip. Other posters advertised long-term immersion rentals in the Hollywood Hills, like the one I had stayed in last night. 

The stairs ended in a huge chamber with train platforms at the far end. A framework of metal beams and stone raised high the massive stonework of the roof. I could hear trains hissing to stops in the distance. Groups of tourists milled about the concourse, some looking like sixties modsters, others dressed in robes of light grey or white. 

Several shops were set up along the perimeter of the station. One of the stores seemed to be selling posters, statues of Jim Morrison and Mama Cass, and other junk. The largest of the shops, and the busiest, was the costume shop, dressing the recently arrived tourists in new sixties finery. Other shops sold a variety of alcohol and narcotics, everything you could think of, with signs in the windows like "Make your experience authentic! LSD!" and "Speed! The fuel of the music industry."

I drew closer to the trains. The sleek, molded cars hovered on the rail silently. I wandered down the platform until I spotted a route map on a small pedestal next to a row of benches. 

I read through the names of the stops. It was like a grocery list of the biggest West Coast rock scenes of the last forty years: Seattle, 1989; Portland 1996; San Francisco, 1993; San Francisco, 1967; Los Angeles, 1973; Los Angeles 1984; and the stop I stood at, Los Angeles, 1966. At the end of the line, a green circle designated the main station.

At the top of the map read the words, "The Rock and Roll Earth Experience: California Dreaming!"

"This isn't some kind of amusement park," I found myself saying out loud, "this is worse!" 

Tourists eyed me suspiciously and moved away. I could only stand there as the realization washed over me. This was some kind of bizarre safari park, but instead of lions, giraffes, and elephants, it was the legends of rock and roll. 

But why was I here? I wasn't a rock legend. I still played my friends' parties for free. I'd only recorded four songs and those were on a CD that I had a hard time giving away. My inclusion in this weird menagerie just didn't fit. 

I boarded the next train headed to the main station and sat down in one of the vinyl seats. The doors whispered shut and the train plunged into the tunnel.

When we passed the Portland, 1996 station, I could see two park rangers walking the platform and studying the crowd through the windows of the train. I stayed on the train and they never looked in my direction, but I got the idea that they were looking for someone. Maybe they knew I would try to get back to Stella. 

The main station was much grander than any I had seen before. Dozens of tracks lead out of the roundhouse. I read their route maps and quickly saw that each line ran through a different region of simulated Earth. There was a whole rail dedicated to various historical New Yorks, another to various Londons. One rail went through a simulated Mississippi Valley with stops in Memphis 1955, Nashville 1957, and several New Orleans of different time periods. 

On the opposite end of the concourse I saw a large sign over a turnstile that read, "To Hotels." I walked with the stream of tourists towards this gate. I slowed my pace when I saw the park rangers manning the gate, checking the tourists' identification. Each tourist presented a small token that allowed them to pass the gate. I deduced that they must be the identification keys the house kept mentioning last night. 

I melted backwards into the tourists, making again for the trains and hoping none of the rangers had spotted me. I quickly boarded a train headed toward the London simulations and retreated from the main station. I got off in London 1965, figuring, at least, I wouldn't have to change clothes.

I drifted for several weeks after that, from one simulation to another, trying to figure out what my next move should be. I spent my days walking the streets of a simulated London, or a simulated New York, or a Memphis and at night, I slept in empty guest rentals while being asked about my missing identification key. 

I tried several times to make contact with other musicians, but it became quickly apparent that most of them didn't see through the illusion like I did. When I did succeed in speaking with one of them, they usually mistook me for some kind of delusional fan. Otis Redding called security on me, and Sonny Bono tried to punch me in the mouth before running away. 

I had thought I had made a break through one afternoon while watching John Denver performing a concert in 1973 Los Angeles's Beverly Gardens Park. I managed to find him after he finished playing and approached. His eyes went big behind his granny glasses when I started to ask him if he ever sensed anything strange about the world around him. He refused to talk to me there but said under his breath, "meet me at West Hollywood Park at sundown, just went of the pool." He then picked up his acoustic guitar and walked off. 

I took a city bus to the park and waited for an hour for Denver to show up. Just as the last of the sun had slipped under the horizon, I saw John Denver's bushy blonde mane poke out from some trees and frantically search the horizon. He was afraid of something but I couldn't see what. 

I started walking his direction until he turned and mouthed the word "no" at me.  

I stopped mid-stride. A second or two later, Denver broke from his leafy cover with a crash and took off running across the park toward the baseball diamonds. He held his guitar case in one hand as he awkwardly galloped across the grass. 

Denver shot a terrified glance over his shoulder, his glasses reflecting the last moments of the sunset and screamed, "Leave me alone, you assholes! I'm not ready, I'm not!" 

I watched as three female park rangers exploded from the bushes to run him down. Denver shrieked and, in a desperate attempt to lighten his load, jettisoned the guitar case, which bounced on the ground and coughed up the guitar with an atonal twang. 

But it was no use, the agents closed the distance between them and the country folk singer in seconds. One agent stopped and aimed what looked like a taser at Denver and pulled the trigger. 

There was a pop that sounded like a champagne cork and Denver fell face-first into the turf. The agents quickly surrounded his body and started dragging it back the way they'd come. A short while later, an agent came back and collected Denver's guitar, returned it to its case, and disappeared into the trees.