1968

I have been washed by waves of nostalgia the past couple of weeks. Why is that?? I think some of it has to do with being of a 'certain age.' It's hard to be nostalgic about anything when you're 25; it's only with age that you accumulate worthwhile memories. And it's only with age and experience that you can place those memories in perspective. So, my next few blog posts will focus on some of those 'waves' that have come my way recently. Echoes of 1968 reverberate. This picture of Bobby Kennedy was taken by a friend of mine...actually in 1966 during a Colorado speech. Art was a still photographer for CBS back then; he made me several copies of photos he took of RFK that year. Bobby was my first political 'love.' I was too young to vote for his older brother and still too young to vote for Bobby in 1968. Inspite of not being of voting age yet, a friend and I went to hear him speak in San Diego a few days before he was assassinated in Los Angeles. I wept when I heard the radio announcement that he had been killed.This was only one of the tumultous events of that year. The Viet Nam war was raging, Martin Luther King was assassinated, there was violence at the Democratic National Convention, the 1967 summer of love had given 'way to the 1968 summer of hate. Listening to 'Hearing Voices' this morning on NPR, I was mesmerized by those events and others. I wept as I heard Martin's "I Have a Dream" speech. Forty years...we're almost there...hold on, Martin! The music of the era was the underpinning of the radio program. The Beatles, Joe Cocker, Aretha, Cream...songs of my young adulthood. I wept again...where did that idealistic and youthful time go?

Is this what nostalgia is about? Feeling sad, shedding tears, wondering if things have really improved in the past 40 years? Maybe...but I intend to pull out my DVD of the Monterey Pop Festival and watch it this evening. Let's see if the 1967 'summer of love' can lift my spirits! I'll get back with you.....