When after fifteen years of city nitelife, I left Manhattan to make a better life for myself in the country, it was hard to imagine there was any life outside of my city existence.  I left thinking I was giving up on everything. I didn’t have the brains to realize that things could be just as exciting and weird living in the country…and let me tell you  it is magically weird.  You see, one thing that people might not know about the village of Woodstock and its surrounding areas is that it is steeped in mythological history. Halloween is its biggest and most powerful holiday and sometimes you can feel the ancient spirits looking over your shoulder.

Now my Stiletto guitarist , Owie as I call him, built this recording studio in the woods and he built it from the trees that he felled on the property.  When you walk into the studio it is a shrine to rock and roll incidents, happenings, shows and artists of days gone by. But its not just the old stuff, it’s kind of like how CBGB’s, had Hilly never removed the posters underneath to make way for the new.  Layers and Layers.

It's off the beaten path and only those drawn by the magic vibe find their way. Producer Jon Hamlin is  one of the most recent discoverers of the studio. The equipment is analogue, and most of it is vintage.  It is home to NY Doll Sylvain Sylvain’s Flying V, Paul Stanley’s custom made moon guitar, wha wha pedals from the sixties, the list goes on.  But as you move deeper into the environment you might spot Genya Raven’s astrological sculpture, or a doll some young band brought there convinced it was bewitched, or a 3 foot tall hand-lathe bowling pin that we have viable cause to believe was once used by Rip Van Winkle.

When the weather is nice, and sometimes when its not, we just sit on the porch, oil lamps burning and we watch the skies: the humming birds and swallows darting through the meadow, the red piliated woodpecker boring into a tree, and at sunset the bats clearing the mosquitoes out of the air, flying in the pattern of infinity.

And along with all that nature and an occasional UFO siting, thunder storms derive from the mountain…the mountain that has the monolith of a Native American hero carved into its cliffs.
It seems all the weather and activity that approaches, comes from this mountain that looms over this land I am pretty convinced is sacred. And the scariest part is when it is quiet: no crickets, no wind or activity, just still, silent space.

My Owie as I call him, has become gatekeeper of this space.  He is a New York rocking freak in the seventies, who would find no surprise in any story of the Manhattan experience he’s there all the time, focusing on so many things that would just fly over most people’s busy heads.

So one evening I show up for sunset on the porch and Owie say’s "El, I am really upset.  If the French don’t want Jim anymore.  I would take his shrine and put him here."

I have been so damn busy that I had no idea  that France doesn’t want Jim Morrison’s grave anymore.  My first reactions??  "Disgusting!, what has Jim Morrison got to do with anything alive in France.  What IS THEIR PROBLEM???"

Now I thought Owie’s idea of burying him on the property was a bit far out but then I had to check myself. After all, It was I who went to my old bass player Alter Ego’s funeral  and nixed the idea of casting his ashes in the East River.  "What A mortifying thought!!"  It was me, who called Owie from the funeral home and asked if I could bring "Alter" home to the studio.   It was me who strapped Alter’s ashes into my Le Baron Convertible in fall a few years ago, and drove him to the studio while his spirit kept changing the dial on the on the radio.  By the way, on that ride up, Alter reminded me of all his favorite songs.
Alter is still in the studio, rocking to new experiments being made every day by a rainbow of musical artists who create there.   But still, if we want to bring Jim home, he has to be placed in a legitimate graveyard.

The next evening, Owie imparted that he re-thought his passion and we came up with a more feasible idea.  Now really, I don’t know if anyone in La-La Land even has the presence to realize the body of a veteran hero of the ‘60’s revolution needs to be tended to.  And I am sure that once we start petitioning to bring Jim Morrison’s body home, everyone’s going to lay claim to him.  I really would like to make something respectable happen. Owie is right!  We have to bring Jim Morrison HOME.

Now I really  don’t know how much anyone cares about this, but we are going to put some wheels in motion.  Let’s bring Morrison home.  He was my dead sweetheart’s friend.  He is a part of American Rock and Roll history.  Somebody’s got to say it and so Elda Sez…. Let’s do something about this!  I’ll never get why he was buried in France to begin with. Hey, if you feel like me, or if you have a different take on this issue, I would like to hear from you. E-mail me and let me know how this thought effects you, your input will help us to start our campaign to bring Jim back.  Hell, the don’t call LA "The City Of Angels" for nothin’, they always want everything tied up in a pretty package with a bow. When its a tougher issue, New York always has to lead the way!
 

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