peace, love and the sound of the 60s…

I popped one of my fave CDs into the player, picked up my book and went outside to read and lounge in the warm sun. A quiet day, perfect for relaxing. The music started …

Love is but the song we sing,
And fear's the way we die …

Ahhhh, The Youngbloods, singing what I sometimes consider my anthem.

C’mon people, now
Smile on each other
Everybody get together
Try and love one another right now

The cultural phenomenon of the 60s is generally considered to be from 1963 to 1973. If you had any part in the 60s, you’d love this CD, Summer of Love, The Sound of 1967. Songs like Whiter Shade of Pale (Procol Harum), Daydream Believer (The Monkees), Groovin’ (The Rascals); bands like The Mamas & The Papas, Strawberry Alarm Clock, The Grass Roots. Great music.

Everything just felt so perfect, listening to the music, easing into a Sunday afternoon reverie. I laid down my book and closed my eyes … the music sparking memories, floating through my thoughts …

- Inna Gadda Da Vida playing at the junior high dance; the school auditorium’s screen pulled down; colored gels on the glass of the overhead projector creating a psychedelic light show

- my comfy moccasins, dark brown suede, no fringe

- wearing feathers on a length of leather thong, tied in my long hair

- the British Invasion: music, clothing, make-up styles; hot pants, mini-skirts, halter tops made from Indian cloth; Twiggy’s painted-on lashes that I tried so carefully to emulate

- Love’s Baby Soft: “Wear your love like heaven …” (Donovan)

- Innocent love: Johnny Angel (How I Love Him)

- Casio keyboards

- Lovely, gentle, happy hippies; the Peace Movement; wearing flowers in my hair; Mom calling me Joan Baez as I sat cross-legged on the family room floor, playing my guitar (Wake up, Maggie, I think I’ve got something to say to you …)

- John F. Kennedy. My mom campaigned for his election and we spent many hours stuffing and licking envelopes as little kids. JFK was the first president I was truly aware of and, as such, he set the bar for what I feel a president should be. I’ve not known another president to come close to the stature and greatness that I perceived in this man.

- The Space Program. Civil Rights. Women’s Rights. The end of Jim Crow laws. Vietnam. Sit-ins. Freedom. Counter culture and social revolution. The Peace Corps. The assassinations. Has anybody here seen my old friend Bobby? Can you tell me where he’s gone?

I was just growing up and all of this social upheaval around the world became part of my childhood experience; this was my normal. The world did a profound shift and I shifted with it. It still seems like such a golden time, the music integral to the experience. Images continued to float through my mind as I lounged in the sun, enjoying my quiet Sunday afternoon.

What makes you think love will end
when you know that my whole life depends … on you …

The Association - Never My Love by epb21

Child dance …

“What inspires you?”, my friend Sandra posted on Facebook. Oh! So many things, my friend! The smell of fresh air, of ocean air: fresh, summery, full, vibrant, with a tinge of citrus around the edges. And the green of the trees outside my window, where the squirrels chase one another up and down and across the limbs and tiny hummingbirds come to visit and peek in my bedroom window. Wide, open horizons stretching out to forever. Watching the sun setting over the ocean, painting the sky in pinks and purples, a giant orb slowly descending toward the water, slowly, slowly, then—flash!—and it’s gone.

Everything made by the Divine inspires me: a budding flower, a tumbling waterfall, the ocean breeze lifting my hair and tossing tendrils across my eyes, a playful puppy with too-big paws, the waves as they move in and out, never ending, calming, rhythmic.

All these inspire me. What I think I find most inspirational of all, though, are children. Their honest, plain-spoken truth of exactly what they know. Unfiltered, unedited, untarnished by others’ thoughts and opinions. Trusting absolutely. Confident and beautiful. Children already know everything they need to know. They laugh and play. They fall down and get back up and run again and again. Free, unfettered. Whee! One child asks another “Do you want to be my friend?” and they join hands and run off to the swings together, with nothing more in common with one another than their mere presence on the playground at the same time. No judgment, no conditions. You are here, I am here. Let’s be friends!

Children know how to be. Their world is comprised of everything they’ve ever experienced up to this moment; nothing more, nothing less. Children know how to open their arms wide and spin, faces lifted to the warm sun, happiness beaming from every pore. They can dance without reservation, just for the sheer joy of moving, light and happy and natural. I always say, I want to party like a 10-year-old.

Children are pure. They are filled with unconditional love. Fresh from the Divine, they still sparkle and glow with an aura that vibrates with all that is holy.