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Last Updated: 2, Apr 2018 - 10:02 |
A 1970’s summer
Lush, green, humid, rainy day, incense, background music of Crosby Stills Nash and Young, 4 Way Street, smell of freshly painted walls, smells of a very clean house. Sitting listening to music touching my soul, my lost teenage soul, music to ponder, there is something much larger out in the world, wanting to break out of my upper class shell, get dirty, help people, the cause, be free, be cool, be loved, something bigger out there. Loving, controlling parents, conform have to break out! Wanting so desperately to be a part of it all, the changes, the movement, the tail end of the revolution, hanging onto the coat tails of the generation ahead that paved the way for freedom. So confused and lost, where am I? Eric Clapton’s Layla, Lou Reed, Led Zeppelin and Jethro Tull, Yes, Eagles, so many, but yet so young, but yet holding onto those coat tails hoping to be carried away to another space a helping space, a cool space a space to be a part of something helping. Endless humid Kansas City nights, music 8 track in the car and albums on the stereo, the vehicle to dream to go on, to live, to explore the world! Smoking blueberry cigars at the creek, listening to music on and on, Cat Stevens, rain, taking trash bags sliding down our hill in the rain, I miss Liz, I miss Anne, I miss those days. Mary Gilday, Mary Sue Mulhern, what a trip, life lasted forever and a day, long days baking at the swimming pool, frying our skin, smoking pot, and being stupid. Bread “It don’t matter to me” Dave why? I miss you! Tice what happened? I miss you! Endless days with Liz and laughing so hard we would wet our pants! Where are we all? Where is our 70’s summer? How long would we keep it alive? Beatles “Here Comes The Sun" running across Liz’s pool cover just to see if we could do it. Fourth of July a coffee can full of black jack firecrackers endlessly lighting them off. Beatles "Dear Prudence" listening with friends hot summer afternoons, relax nap. But the ever-present deep sadness buried very deep, hidden deeply from friends and family. Escape, music. Being cool hanging out at the pool at the club or friends private pools, leather bands made into knotted bracelets, wrist and ankle, POW bracelets, cut-off jean shorts, tan a must, long hair parted in the middle, army fatigue jackets, defiant! Listening to the Moody Blues in Anne’s older brother's room on their record player, raining, just listening, relaxing, thinking, dreaming of life ahead, dreaming of wanting to meet really cute guys, laughing, dreaming! Laughing at our past styles go go boots and having a desire to dance in a cage, new style boots to the knees and hot pants, tight blue jeans, clogs, halter tops. Friday nights watching midnight special at EDS initials Eastland, Danner, and Shull. Makeshift Nightclub in the Danner’s basement. Two have gone before I miss them! Such crazy times surrounded by concerts, hot humid summer nights, sunbathing, sleepovers with girlfriends, hoping that one special guy would call, taking life for granted, constant state of change, evolution revolution, LBJ, t-shirts mocking Spiro T Agnew, Nixon. Cold War, civil rights movement, riots, burning of cites and looting curfews, looting, drugs, the world was moving so fast around me. I was not old enough to jump on, frustrated, lost, suicide, I found a place finally a volunteer for a suicide hot line, I got to be a part of the changing world. I started to find me, always a square peg trying to fit into a round hole. Breaking away from my affluent family, considered less than, I wanted to role my sleeves up and just get in their, right in the middle of it all, I fit in the trenches. A 1970s summer so very long ago.
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