I saw Arlo and Pete on June 30, 1985, when an estimated 50,000 people descended on Hartwood Acres to see them. People abandoned their cars along the road to walk to the site, and neighbors complained for years afterward.

I also and saw Arlo and his daughter at Deer Path Park in Flemington, NJ a dozenish years later.

Going back before Hartwood Acres I’ve always associated Alice’s Restaurant Massacre with Thanksgiving. The best way to hear it, for me, is to be driving around somewhere at 9am, noon, or 3pm on Thanksgiving Day and to listen to it playing on the radio. As late as 2004, it was easy to find multiple stations playing at those times. After that, I quit cars and radios for a good while, and these days, I go to Youtube.

Around a month ago, a friend shared a Facebook post from Arlo called Gone Fishing in which Arlo described his mini-strokes, dating back to April Fools Day, 2016, and his more recent decision to stop performing.

And so this is the first Thanksgiving after the Arlo’s last performance.