Thursday, May 22, 2014

TRUTH:
            
In order to live free, I had to explore the truth. I had to be stunned and rocked by it. I wanted to FEEL it. From a society of look-good, act-proper, and feel-nothing, my family ran by a set of discombobulated rules. So much was fake, and secret, and I had to run forward (never “straight”) and not look back. A fresh reality and daring headspace were in my future. I knew it, I needed it, so I went looking for it.


            It wasn’t a part-time pursuit. I had to indulge fully. The impetuses for running were my restless heart and soul. I had dabbled in independence and in the shakiness of truth. It shook with energy, power I couldn’t resist. It was breath and survival to me. It also shook with fear of untapped emotion.
So what did I do? There appeared to be only one path…
Turn On, Tune In, and Drop Out!!

According to Wikipedia, Timothy Leary coined this expression in 1966. He explained: “It urged people to embrace cultural changes through the use of psychedelics and by detaching themselves from the existing conventions and hierarchies in society.”  Made sense to me. I was into the experiment...

In reflection, Leary said this in his 1983 autobiography, “Flashbacks”:

“Turn on’ meant go within to activate your neural and genetic equipment. Become sensitive to the many and various levels of consciousness and the specific triggers that engage them. Drugs were one way to accomplish this end. ‘Tune in’ meant interact harmoniously with the world around you – externalize, materialize, express your new internal perspectives. Drop out suggested an elective, selective, graceful process of detachment from involuntary or unconscious commitments. ‘Drop Out’ meant self-reliance, a discovery of one’s singularity, a commitment to mobility, choice, and change. Unhappily my explanations of this sequence of personal development were often misinterpreted to mean ‘Get stoned and abandon all constructive activity.”



Tuesday, May 13, 2014

FREEDOM!!

Thinking a lot lately about what it meant to be free in the 1970s. Several non-definitions come to mind:
  • Living free didn't come without cost. It didn't mean without struggle. But it did mean with options, heart and mind open, and willing.
  • Free living did not mean freeloading off your parents or society. It meant making choices in which you were in charge and being respectful.
  • And the freedom we were seeking in that time of experimentation had a personal accountability to which we all (the survivors anyway) lived. The mores of our society were clear, but elastic. They could be bent, tugged and challenged but never broken. Those who regularly misbehaved threatened to tear the fabric of our bond and lifestyle, they were shunned. The code was fairness, love, caring, and sharing.                   

                         Richie Havens: FREEDOM @ Woodstock

      When I went in search of freedom, I was looking for a clutch of peers. My goal was to be free of attachments, not to be alone. It was to belong to a group of freethinking individuals who drifted together in the same space. To share ideas, resources, care and joy, while working hard. We were insolent with humor. We broke the rules, and tiny laws… not the big ones. We wanted to remain free to roam and explore and define ourselves.
When the mood or circumstances changed, moving on was simple in a free society. It was what we wanted. We could have found it in any numbers of communes, those with names and those off the grid. The popular places were in Berkeley or the Haight or Greenwich Village or Vermont. In Jackson Hole, there were no such communes. There were only cowboys, cops and confused kids.
Anyway, at sixteen, I would have been considered undesirable. I was too young to be on my own. But I was confused and angry. I left home. I was on my own. For a time, I flopped at my best friend’s house. While she and her mom were at work, I smoked pot and wedged my head between their two giant speakers. I cranked up Led Zeppelin. I let my brain spin, my heart feel, and my body electrify. I had turned to drugs and music for comfort and understanding.  They understood me. I didn’t look back I didn't dare! 
I was on the road to find out.