January 23, 2005
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Chapter 8 – Flower Children (cont.)
(For previous chapters see sidebar)Before moving on, I want to make clear that in retrospect, I’ve learned not to romanticize anything about drugs (including alcohol). Most of us were young, naive, and ignorant of a lot of the ramifications at the time. What was addictive was the whole spiritual picture, of which drugs were just a part. In January 1967 (just in time for the great Human Be-In in Golden Gate Park where I wandered about with Jane on my hip and listened to the famous bands), we moved to a lower flat in one of those marvelous old Victorians in the Haight-Ashbury. It was like Oz, where you stepped into technicolor after a long black-and-white fall. Surrounded by teenagers from all over the country hellbent to escape suburbia, I was a bit older than the average immigrant. Michael McClure lived on our block. He and the late Richard Brautigan often walked past our house. We had a free box for clothes on our front porch. There were music posters by Peter Max, concerts at the Fillmore, the Diggers free store, David Smith’s Free Clinic, and comics by R. Crumb. Various people came and went in our flat, which had two big fireplaces in the huge front room. In due time, the bottom dwellers (dealers, cultists, and various other creepy folks) would move into the Haight, people who carried guns and drugs cut with amphetamines. In the spring Felix unexpectedly returned and whatever hope I had that we could revisit a relationship died for good. Looking back now, I believe he had become addicted to harder drugs and wasn’t able to connect with his baby daughter. He hung around the Haight for awhile and, as I turned 28 that summer, he was gone, for good this time, destined to see his daughter again only when she came looking for him in Switzerland as a teenager. In August Jane and I made another visit to Corvallis to see my parents and other relatives.
Deep Thought: “If you’re ever stuck in some thick undergrowth, in your underwear, don’t stop and start thinking of what other words have “under” in them, because that’s probably the first sign of jungle madness.”
Today I am grateful for: Hibbing, Minnesota
Guess the Movie: “Gentlemen. The hopes and dreams of an entire town are riding on your shoulders. You may never matter more than you do right now. It’s time.” Answer: Friday Night Lights, 2004.
Support Our Troops: Bring Them Home
by Howard Zinn
We must withdraw our military from Iraq, the sooner the better. The reason is simple: Our presence there is a disaster for the American people and an even bigger disaster for the Iraqi people. (Rest of article here.)
End of Day: 8:44 pm
+ = Saw In Good Company – very enjoyable.
- = Feeling kind of vulnerable about sharing my story lately.
Comments (14)
Catching up, reading and reading. Enthralling. Your words create echoes in my heart… thank you for pouring out your experiences.
“The whole spiritual picture” – you have me thinking about community, about safety, knowing that other people are looking out for you, the clothes box on the porch, sharing food. Though not of your generation, I’ve been in those kinds of spaces, some where drugs were, some not and to me the most profound thing was just feeling safe, maybe feeling personally alone inside myself, but that on the outside there were always people who would feed me, offer a hug or a listening ear, safety. It’s sad that the bottom feeders, as you say, came along – that some people find unkindness irresistable.
Maybe I’m square, but I’m glad I managed to miss all of that. It’s been a bumpy but at least a drug-free ride, for which I am grateful.
I’m not sure what the opposite of “square” is, but I’m hopeful that my story does not represent an attempt to be “hip” or “cool” and that once it is all written it will be seen that the most significant part of it is the fact that one can dig out any dark place in life. Having said that, it is my story and I stick by it.
You’ve got a few years on me, but I can relate to many of your experiences (especially relative to the drug scene). I wouldn’t care to cloud my mind with LSD or pot again, but deep down I’m glad I had those experiences. In some cases I felt that whole period of time in my life to be very mind-expanding and freeing. I appreciate your individuality and willingness to be so forthright. Bully for you!
Those were exciting years to put it mildly. I lived in Seattle and the surrounding area when I experimented with various diets/beliefs/lifestyles and substances.
Personally I think the quality of substances gradually got worse. For the most part I enjoyed my visionary experiences with mushrooms, marijuana, mescaline and LSD. I never got into the “hard drugs” thankfully. There is absolutely nothing beautiful about that kind of addiction.
From those years I saw both sides and it wasn’t hard to choose the path of peace and love.
I don’t know, even with all I now know, I would happily defend our human right to mind-altering substances and the experience that comes with that… ah anyway, no personal confessions here, that would be far too long.
There’s something though, absolutely amazing about being at the center of a cultural experience of profound consequence: London and San Francisco in the mid 60s for example, for me, darker moment of Brooklyn/Lower Manhattan in the early 80s. It isn’t that it’s in any way “all good,” but it something unforgettable, and it’s something most of the world misses out on, and it creates great writing… from Ten Days That Shook the World, to Tom Wolfe, to lionne…
Thanks for your consistent encouragement and inspiration.
I look forward to reading more
Felt a serenity at the ‘hub’. From drugs, it seems, flowed creativity–poetry, deep thoughts and a great awareness of the wrongs of the world. Revolution for change.
Thank you for the kind comments on my poetry. They were from a time that I started my therapy.
Your writing is such absorbing reading-thank you for sharing your life.
The vulnerability thing is real, and I know it takes courage. But if you weren’t telling the story really well, there would be no likelihood of that. A strange authors’ conundrum.
I should go to bed but I really want to comment. I’ll try to keep it short.
I feel terribly lucky to have been part of that scene in the late ’60s. I went to the U of O in ’68 and until about ’76 I lead a zany life. I regret being too stoned to get off my chair and go experience life some of the time but on the other hand when I did go on adventures they were over the top.
The fact that you were actually living right in the heart of things, makes it all the more important for you to get it finished. It’s going great, by the way. I only wish you had the time here for more details.
it seems like a very bleek story but underneith all of the horor you and you daughter manage to survive and that is a very wonderful message, that even when all seems to be in riuns around you there is hope and there will always be hope.
Wow it must have been quite fun to have wandered through the Human-Be-In, to have been there. Things in your own life sounded very rough though.
Despite the drugs there is so many wonderful things that came from that time in the 60′s, it would be nice if that feeling of love and peace could return in force! Thanks for taking us back, I’ve always felt connected to that time even though it happened a couple of years before my birth. Still enjoying your story greatly, thanks for sharing.