I’m walking along Ocean Beach and pass by a street vendor hippie type of guy who’s selling jewelry. I pick up this bracelet, and he tells me it has a garnet stone, which works wonders for my root chakra! I’m not too sure where that is, but I tell him I’m entering my Miles Davis period and ask him if it will help… (He likes Miles Davis (jazz)) and he asks if I’m a musician.

I tell him, yes, but I’m speaking about the time Miles asked his father for bus fare to go home and kick his heroin habit. He locked himself away for a week and emerged free after wrestling the devil. It has been written that he indulged a little here and there after that, but his major addiction was gone.

The street Vendor asked what I was trying to kick. I answered, Long story but basically, my own ass… “Yep, IT’LL DO THAT he says. (love a hippie who knows how to sell).

So I gave him some cash. Ten bucks over the asking price (good karma), and slap it on my wrist. I’m not a big jewelry guy, but I kind of like this piece.

Artisan street vendors are a breed unto themselves. As Mary Faith Rhodes (long-time dulcimer player) once said about dulcimer players (same type of vibe back in the early ’70s)…”Well, we always were a strange lot”.

Now it may just be the vendor’s promise of better things to come… but when I woke up the next morning, I think my root chakra was doing its thing.