1969 - Living In the Past?



listen to: Jethro Tull: Living in the Past

Returning to our old lives was impossible. So much had changed in our absence, before us lay a summer of music, expressive and raucous, enhanced by a fresh free spirit, enhanced by reefer/hash. Our old friends embraced us and led the way. I fell in, and found an exciting perch on the edge of a new craziness.

Our parents took us to Provincetown to see Richie Havens at the Blues Bag club. Uncensored P’town was a summer Greenwich Village: an artsy, musical, hipster circus atmosphere that enchanted and unsettled me. But the drums of change were calling, and I was caught up in the beat.

In late June, my best friend, Barbara Gregson, and I hitched a ride with Dede and Becky to the Newport Jazz Festival. I recall the frenzy and seduction of the music. She remembers:

 "We walked along with swarms of people, to the ticket booth and were told the show was sold out. We stood around for a minute or so and the next thing you know, people before us and behind us pushed the walls down, we just gingerly walked in... LA De DAh!... with a sea of people around us. Jethro Tull was playing as we came onto the concert grounds. We moved up front and I remember sitting next to some nice hairy people. They were passing pot and a gallon jug of red wine around, of which we partook, of course, and passed it down the line. We had such fun and had great seats; I don't remember how we got home..."

Later, we were deemed too young to go to Woodstock, so we will always be grateful to Newport and the mob.


Betsy (& Dede) got to go to Woodstock!


Note from Wikipedia on the 1969 Newport Jazz Festival: Miles Davis noticed and appreciated the spirited nature of the younger audience. But some clashes did occur. Excess crowds of several thousand who had been unable to obtain tickets filled an adjacent hillside, and the weekend was marred by disturbances including fence crashing and crowd surging during the most popular performances.

1969 – Just a song before I go… a lesson to be learned

Over nine months, we had seen thirty-four countries, on five continents, learned of innumerable languages, cultures, foods, and climates. It had been a groovy, shocking, scary and moving surprise, at every turn. By June, all travels and eye-openers would be behind us.

Except for one: we were heading home, but to where? The family, or travel agents,would have to choose our new home. Forget negotiating hotels in Arabic, cafés in Thai or flights in Swahili, we had to decide -in English!- where we would live next. A tall order for anyone, but when Daddy presented his wife and gaggle of teens the voting ballot, we knew there was no way out of it. We would have to choose.

The options were dynamic: 1) a village near Nairobi, 2) a farm in Tuscany, 3) the island of St. John, USVI, 4) an off-season dude ranch in Jackson, Wyo. and 5) a small town in New Zealand. We had been to most of these locations; Daddy reviewed the pros and cons of each. We’d never heard of Jackson Hole, newly opened resort touting “the best skiing in the world,” Daddy said.

When the votes were tallied, Jackson Hole won unanimously! Overwhelmingly, we wanted to be “normal” American teenagers, back in high school, doing those stupid things teens did. We’d be heading to all-American small-town Wyoming… We had NO idea what that meant, we had a lesson to be learned. But first… the Summer of Love was ahead of us, a time to catch up, get hip, get stoned.

                                                                 
          Crosby, Stills & Nash: Just a Song Before I Go