As best as Lucas the Distracted is able to follow, the movie is about two longhairs who use the profits from a drug deal to buy motorcycles and ride across the country looking for truth and meaning. Along the way, they encounter the sorts of bigotry and hostility that long-haired freaks often encounter. Only because it’s a movie, theirs is more extreme and violent (though, come to think of it, considering what happened to Cousin Barry, maybe not).

The two actors ride choppers with extended front forks and lots of shiny chrome. One has ape bars. These are the kinds of cycles that Lucas associates with motorcycle gangs like the Pagans and Hells Angels, not with peace-loving longhairs. He feels bad for Lou Wilkinson. Easy Rider is the number one movie across the country this week. Any freaks who see it are bound to think that custom-made choppers are the way to go, not clunky old British bikes with pedigree and gravitas.

After the movie, Tinsley drives to the junior high and leads Lucas to an isolated spot in the woods. Along the way, another doobie gets reduced to ash. The golden-haired woodland sprite finds a spot suitable to her whims and spreads the blanket. She doesn’t ask if this is what Elf Lucas wants; she just assumes. Well, she’s right. It’s not like they were merely holding hands during the movie. Elf Lucas feels ready to go. (Besides, it would defy belief to think that up near the polar ice cap, Lady Robin’s only been rubbing noses with Samuel the Skuzzbucket this summer.)

Tinsley and I start to make love. But despite our being primed for action, it feels strange that we’re doing this. Last time, we were tripping — two ids, stripped down to instinct, impulse, and lust. But now my brain is going AWOL. It’s watching the days peel off the calendar month of August, each day counting down to the Dreaded Induction Physical. Next, it’s in an army examination room in San Francisco, anxiously waiting to see if the doctor really will give me a 1-Y deferment. And now it’s with Robin, doing the New York Times crossword in the high-school library.

Oh, what I’d give for it to be Robin on this blanket, not even having sex, just knowing she wanted to be here with me.

Alas, my brain isn’t the only part of my body that’s not cooperating. Short of a surprise visit from a bear or a forest ranger (neither likely on Long Island), there’s nothing like a systems failure to bring you down. I’m finding it hard (well, maybe “difficult” would better describe it) to comprehend. I mean, I know there’s a first time for everything, but at the lusty age of eighteen?