You Bet Your Sweet Bippy.

No exact figures exist on how many avocado green drink glasses the Gulf Refining Company gave away in 1969, but several landed squarely in the household, of forty-two year-old attorney, Ralph L. Jerman. One evening in late October, youngest son Steven dragged his finger down the bumpy side of one. Beads of moisture gathered as a cool milky ice cream concoction melted inside.

The seven-year-old casually slid his palm across the gnarled surface of the 12 oz. vessel. Bringing it to is lips, luxuriating in his favorite fix like Miles Davis in a subterranean dressing room. Intent, placid eyes stared out of a padded round mug, framed by a shaggy Buster Brown haircut. The face was getting fuller by the day due to all the ‘empty’ calories.

The child savored his confection regularly. Nearly daily. Producing it in an Osterizer with ice cream, milk and any other available ingredients; malted milk, chocolate syrup, caramel, bananas and even peanut butter.

Putting both hands on the glass, he carefully walked through the harvest gold living room, past his father, hidden behind a Salt Lake Tribune, clenching his own liquid contrivance, Old Crow and tap water. Mom was busy with three teenagers and a new toddler whose bloated cheeks and swarthy dark hair made her look like a real live Madam Alexander doll. It was a doll he could live without.

The boy slowly slid down a set of split-level stairs to land in front of a large dark Mediterranean style Sylvania TV. The horn drenched intro song to Rowan and Martin’s Laugh-in was just coming on when he entered the basement ‘family’ room, he was in “the zone.”

When Laugh-in came on the bright yellows, greens and pinks colored the dark basement rec room. The summer of love still lingered. As he had spent that year’s vacation in the San Francisco Bay area. Visions of head-banded longhairs thumbs out stacked at the Oakland freeway onramp. Thoughts of being scolded for jumping on the bed of a cheap Telegraph Avenue motel with his godfather’s son as Neil Armstrong touched down in another room.

There was something he liked about being somewhere else. Berkeley, Burbank or the Moon. Laugh-in took him on a trip. Sketches – blackouts - laughter as if possessed by some spasoming demon - paisley patterned one-liners - all edited into a seamless tambour. - Arte Johnson as a German Soldier appeared from behind a potted palm murmuring, "Verrry interesting!"

And just as Ruth Buzzi began to flap open one of the doors of the crazy quilt set, he pushed the other way. His thoughts were sucked into the tube, though the Laugh-in set, they landed with a thump.

He stood up and it was 12:40 the next day. Halloween day. He was on the playground at Upland Terrace elementary school. This holiday found him dressed as a television hippie. He was wrapped in a bright woven Mexican vest the family had gotten in Tijuana. Carefully patched jeans and love beads completed the look.

And where would a hippie be without his hair? His oldest sister Cathy’s ‘fall’ worked beautifully. The full ochre polyester strands of the hairpiece cascaded all the way to his smooth little potbelly.

Today, Steve can only see the scene from above, like an out-of-body experience. Off to the side of the Whirl-e-gig, nearly every child on the playground that day had gathered tightly around. Ten deep. Urgency built. Who was this?

This kid was truly an attraction. Who sent him? The implications were biblical. No matter how hard he tried, getting back to the dark lonely family room would be impossible, even a chocolate-caramel-peanut butter-banana malt wouldn’t help.