André J de Saint Phalle :||: BOOK ONE - The Spaces Between
“Surfing the Interstates”Book One of
Andre J de Saint Phalle’s
Memoir Trilogy“The Spaces Between”
That summer I was twenty-one and everything was collapsing.My aunt was Niki de Saint Phalle, the world-famous artist who'd accused my grandfather—her father, the Wall Street banker—of things families don't survive.My parents were divorcing after twenty-two years. The 1865 farmhouse on twenty-five acres was being sold.I'd dropped out of college, been disinherited, and was facing Vietnam with empty pockets and nowhere left to run except the road itself. I stole eighty dollars and stuck out my thumb.“Like finding an escape hatch in a sinking submarine. I've read Kerouac. The road is calling."Four thousand miles later, I'd shared peyote with a woman named Sasha who talked to trees, had Jerry Garcia play my guitar and tell me to let it guide me, watched UFOs off Big Sur, lost a friend to his own dark prophecy, and received a vision in a desert canyon that changed everything.Subscribe to receive new chapters as they drop.
"Raw, unflinching 1973 hitchhiking memoir blending family trauma, Vietnam-era tension, Grateful Dead mysticism, and vivid road encounters. Strong voice, evocative prose, no filler—reads like Kerouac raised on acid and Allman Brothers."
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Chapter 1
Thumb Out
Andre's dramatic escape from his family's Westchester estate with just four stolen $20 bills
The traumatic moment that triggers his departure - witnessing domestic violence
First encounters with 1970s hitchhiking culture and the kindness of strangers
A Vietnam veteran's perspective on draft resistance and the war's aftermath
Meeting Rainbow and Derek - cosmic hippie lovers heading to get a motorcycle
The beginning of a 4,000-mile journey that will transform a sheltered young man
Why 1973 was the perfect year for disappearing into America's counterculture underground
Chapter 2
Turn On Your Love Light
A transformative 1970 Grateful Dead concert at Penn that defined a generation
Pigpen's final performances and Andre's mystical connection through a tambourine
A psychedelic encounter with Sara that becomes spiritual and sexual awakening
Gothic cathedral acoustics meeting counterculture communion
How one night of music and acid shaped a young man's search for transcendence
Chapter 3
The Kindness of Strangers
A flute player who steers his VW with his knees while performing
A Vietnam veteran's perspective on draft resistance and road love
Impromptu music sessions with international travelers
The culture clash between road wanderers and college students
Why the "kindness of strangers" was real in 1970s America
Chapter 4
The Price of Paradise
A ride with wealthy women playing at counterculture in a pristine VW Westfalia
Class tensions between trust fund hippies and authentic road culture
Nederland, Colorado mountain community and its contradictions
How prep school background creates both privilege and alienation
The uncomfortable truth about who could afford to "drop out" in 1973
Why some paradise always comes with a price tag
Chapter 5
The Frequency of Freedom
Five strangers become temporary family on a Colorado mountainside
Lucy's philosophy: "We're all in love out here"
Learning that love without walls means love without promises
"We're practicing for the apocalypse"—life after the old world dies
The cracks are where the light gets in
A smooth stone, a Texas address, and a warning disguised as invitation
Chapter 6
The Solitary Push
Andre's dangerous solo journey through hostile Wyoming with police harassment
Haunting memories of college friend Steve Ferry’s transformation from brilliant student to paranoid recluse
The reality of draft resistance and psychological deferments during Vietnam
How fear and isolation corrupted the counterculture dream
Cross-country truckers, speed freaks, and the loneliness of long-distance hitchhiking
The ominous approach to California and a reunion that will change everything
Why some people couldn't handle the freedom they fought for
Chapter 7
Chicken Coop Days
Andre's arrival at Steve Ferry's converted chicken coop in Santa Rosa, California
The powerful metaphor of a lightning-struck redwood that kept growing despite damage
Flashback to their perfect day at RFK Stadium before everything went wrong
Steve's traumatic confrontation with his father and recruitment campaign work
Working California prune farms while Steve's paranoia deepens
The reality of living with someone whose mental health is deteriorating
Why some friendships can't survive the weight of untreated trauma
Chapter 8
Sasha Among the Giants
Andre's escape from paranoid friend Steve to the ancient redwood forests
Three days of profound solitude among two-thousand-year-old giants
Meeting Sasha, a mystical woman who talks to trees at a commune
A transformative peyote experience revealing the consciousness of forests
Visions of home, belonging, and humanity's connection to nature
The realization that some people are meant to be witnessed, not possessed
Why the redwoods became Andre's cathedral and teacher
Chapter 9
Target Practice
The dark side of 1970s counterculture - when dropping out becomes breaking down
Steve's descent into armed paranoia and midnight guitar feedback sessions
The moment friendship becomes dangerous in Sonoma County's plum orchards
A .22 rifle accident that shatters more than car windows
Why sometimes leaving is the most courageous choice you can make
Real counterculture breakdown - no romanticized hippie mythology
The last conversation before Steve's eventual tragic end
Chapter 10
Let The Guitar Decide
The pilgrimage to 1016 Lincoln Street - Grateful Dead headquarters in San Rafael
Jerry Garcia's mystical encounter with a 1935 Harmony Cremona guitar
The moment when music becomes destiny instead of escape
Real 1973 Grateful Dead scene - behind the mythology, inside the magic
Golden Gate Park revelations and notebook confessions
Cosmic Eddie's Uncertainty Principle - the psychedelic bus that shouldn't exist
Highway 1 south toward Big Sur with circus performers and cosmic wanderers
Chapter 11
ZIP!
The cosmic piss stop at Bixby Bridge overlooking Big Sur's impossible cliffs
Two metallic objects appear, moving faster than fighter jets but silent
UFOs scan the Pacific with brilliant light beams, reading ocean patterns
Physics-defying movements - objects teleport instantly without acceleration
The ocean becomes transparent, revealing underwater sacred geometry
A dozen witnesses frozen in disbelief as reality bends around them
Solo camping afterward to process the impossible encounter
Chapter 12
Love Through Stone
Prophetic African dream with three mystical stones and a phone call from mother
Processing the impossible UFO encounter through symbolic visions
Meeting Geoff and Jason - Louisiana boys heading home from California adventures
The concrete sprawl of LA versus the village community never experienced
Peterbilt ride through the Mojave Desert with Willie Nelson soundtrack
Boarding school isolation patterns revealed through dream symbolism
The prophetic feeling of a woman waiting who will teach "Tuesday after Tuesday"
Chapter 13
The Ocean Don’t Lie
Peterbilt ride through desert darkness with Carl, a trucker who lost his son in Vietnam
Phoenix truck stop survival on shared Grand Slam breakfasts and endless coffee
Meeting Wade - Vietnam vet sailor with a gutted VW van and hard-earned wisdom
Near-death tire blowout at 75 mph on Arizona interstate
Wade's sailing philosophy: "The ocean don't lie like land does"
Desert heat reaching 108 degrees and the kindness of wine-soaked strangers
Arrival in Las Cruces with Big Bend Canyon prophecy echoing ahead
Chapter 14
Out in the West Texas Town of El Paso
Lucky Tiger truck stop in El Paso - hostile trucker territory for longhaired hitchhikers
Watching Steve Ferry’s death on morning TV news - prophecy fulfilled in blood
The garage explosion and slow-motion police shooting captured by helicopter
Film canisters labeled "Murder. Insanity. Death." spilling in Steve's blood
Understanding how Vietnam War destroyed those who never went to combat
The impossible task of playing "El Paso" in actual El Paso after witnessing tragedy
Recognition that paranoia becomes reality when you believe hard enough
Chapter 15
The Descending Dark
Midnight truck ride through Texas with gospel radio and grief over Steve Ferry's death
The fateful decision to part ways with Geoff and Jason at the highway junction
Meeting rancher Williams who understands canyon medicine and carrying grief properly
Solo night hike into Santa Elena Canyon seeking ancient healing beyond words
The devastating discovery - Jerry Garcia's blessed 1935 Harmony Cremona stolen
Learning that some losses cut deeper than others, some thefts can't be recovered
Canyon walls as church older than language, indifferent to human suffering
Chapter 16
Phantom Ships
Five-day vision quest fast in Santa Elena Canyon's limestone cathedral
F-4 Phantom military jet desecrating sacred space during low-level training
Rage transforming stones into doves into prayers into nothing
"Wooden Ships" soundtrack to mystical experience and ghostly conversations
Steve Ferry’s spirit explaining his paranoid self-destruction
Prophetic vision of future sailing life and the woman who "moves like water"
The final transformation from roads to water, linear to circular, war to peace
"A masterwork of American road literature... Essential American literature—a book that captures a specific moment (summer 1973) and makes it eternal. Saint Phalle's prose is deceptively simple—clear sentences, vivid details, dialogue that breathes. But beneath that clarity runs a current of poetry."
Subscribe to receive new chapters in my memoir trilogy as they drop.
I am currently writing Book Two: Sahara Dust.
After that comes Book Three: Green Mountain Flash.Subscribe to receive new chapters as they drop.
Copyright - Andre J de Saint Phalle - All Rights Reserved