We hippies are STILL right. A tribute to the "back to the landers" who still sustain.

[Fly by night]

I really appreciated garybeck's "hippie" thread this morning and was sad to see it highjacked by yet another troll. (Bad troll, bad.) So at the urging of other DUers and to expand this Sunday morning's appreciation for a world-view and way of living that still sustains many of us after four decades and models for the rest of us an earth-friendly "alternative" lifestyle, here is my appreciation of the hippies in our midst:
----------

Although it's harder to grow hair on my head than on my back these days, the world view and vibe remain in my heart and under my feet. Thank the Goddess.

I am typing this from my cabin on a farm that I bought (with five partners) back in the heyday of the "back to the land" movement -- 1969-70. We bought a house and 27 acres for $3,000 back then and, two years later, added another 120 acres for $10,000. Bought the land with a life estate agreement with the old couple who lived here before us, and enjoyed seeing Miz Kelly live to be almost 99 years old. Slept under one of her hand-stitched quilts again last night -- her Dresden Plate design -- that she sold me for $10. I was always her "tent boy" since I lived in a tent under a spreading black walnut tree by the creek one summer out here. (I still remember her introducing me to other granny-women, her fellow midwives out here, with the words, "I want you to meet 'tent boy'. He's good people.")

Although my other partners wandered away and sold out their interests in the farm to me over the years, my heart has always remained here. Wrapped in the quiet beauty of fourteen ridges and thirteen valleys, four creeks and a waterfall, no neighbors in sight or within shouting distance (but available in a heart-beat if I need them, or they need me.) And because my body lingered also, I was able to trade some hippie sensi-bility and appreciation for the learning of lots of farming and basic survival skills, passed down from the loggers and moonshiners around here to a new generation of us who had arrived with differently fueled "illegal smiles".

Instead of isolating ourselves and working only on our own farms, my other hippie neighbors and I proved our worth (and our commitment to community) by helping our older neighbors get their square bales into the barn on stormy summer days, by building and renovating our little town's square and community center and then by taking the stage together in those homemade venues to sway to the beat of bluegrass and blues. For all of our Democratic ideals and voting histories, we were accepted locally not only by the many "yellow dog" neighbors out here but by everyone here who knew that -- at heart -- we were deeply committed conservatives too. Working to conserve clean water and air, working to conserve extended families and welcoming communities, working to conserve the "commons" within which all voices were welcome, working to conserve our community schools, working to support those elders whose children had abandoned this way of life and moved to the cities, working to conserve the Native folk wisdom embodied in our home-grown pain medicine (and mood-altering antidote to the depression of serious illness and old age) that our Goddess had bestowed. (Magic seeds don't grow beans, but they sure make beans and fried 'taters taste better.)

This morning, almost forty years later, I awoke in the same cabin, now equipped with indoor plumbing and the internet, prepared to spend my day planting late fall greens and annual ryegrass as a cover crop in my four decade organic garden and to go "deadhead" the zinnias in the little town square's flower beds that I still tend. While there, I might stop by my town's only diner to share a moment with the elders and the other balding hippies (now considered elders out here too), trading words of thanks for an autumn that has finally arrived and the much-needed rains that brought it here. I will take note of the framed copy of a cover story about me ("Marijuana Martyr" -- www.nashvillescene.com/Stories/Cover_Story/2007/04/26/M... ) that the diner owner has placed prominently on the wall (next to the pictures of our local church groups and high school basketball teams) to welcome me home from my 18 month stint in a federal Bureau of Prisons halfway house. (She tells me that framed cover story will never leave her wall, in partial thanks for the help I gave her husband before he died.) And if I have the energy left as the sun sets behind my western ridge at 4:00 pm, I will drive north to the outskirts of Nashville to sit in a circle of other Tenase hippies gathered to hear wisdom from three elders from within our midst, and to share the fruits of our fall gardens (me bringing homemade pumpkin pecan bread).

Yes, the hippie ethos is alive and well in Fly Holler, TN this cool autumn morning. We've known all this time that, truly, "it is all good". Good enough to conserve, good enough to share, good enough to cherish, good enough to work hard to hold on to. Good enough to give away.

Peace out.

[fightthegoodfightnow]

1. Bravo - Live Long and Prosper

....................and most of all search for and live peace.

[Rambis]

68. Kick

:kick:

[Warpy]

2. Yeah, we were right

I always lacked the ability to buy land to go back to, so I rented land and had a huge organic garden, grew for local shops. Several years of it convinced me I was a poor farmer and should find something else to do with my time, and eventually went into nursing. Right livelihood was right livelihood, whether it was done in overalls or scrubs.

We were right about other things, like cooperation and decentralization being more important than the dog eat dog materialism of our parents and the greedhead yuppies who followed us. We were right about sustainability. Most of all, we were right about the ruinous natures of both war and empire.

Nobody's going to give us a medal, of course. We would just love to live long enough to see that pendulum swing back again toward what we were right about all along.

Peace out, indeed.

[MelissaB]

3. K&R! I remember reading that story about you and have been wondering

how things turned out. :hi:

BTW, your link to the story isn't working. If you have another I'm sure other DU'ers would enjoy reading it.

[Fly by night]

5. Here's the "Marijuana Martyr" link again. Hope it works now.

www.nashvillescene.com/Stories/Cover_Story/2007/04/26/Marijuana_Martyr/index.shtml

Here are two other links to "my" story (one an excellent nationally syndicated column by Robert Koehler) that sadly is shared by too many (still) in this country.

www.saveberniesfarm.com
www.commonwonders.com/archives/col391.htm

Folks, there was a reason our Indian elders called it the "peace pipe".

Peace out.

[Fly by night]

4. "When the world wearies and society ceases to satisfy, ...

... there is always the garden." Minnie Aumonier.

And there's also always DU. I hope, I hope.

Now it's time to get my hands in the dirt this bright October day.

[radiclib]

6. Here's to you, Fly by night

for walkin' the walk :toast:K&R

[MaggieSwanson]

7. K&R

Peace, friends.

[Webster Green]

8. K&R!

Excellent!

[Fly by night]

9. Here's the link to garybeck's original "hippie" thread this morning.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=2100224&mesg_id=2100224

Thanks, Gary, for reminding me just how sweet a considered (and quiet) life of gentle action and deep reflection can be. And still is.

[malaise]

10. Hippies were right

Al Gore is right and Peaceniks are right!

[InvisibleTouch]

11. Excellent!

How excellent that you've been able to live your own truth and connect with the land, and build a community at the same time. Most people don't have that opportunity - or (perhaps more accurately) don't realize that they do. I'm still trying to get there myself. :) Good on you!

[Gregorian]

12. I'm so glad to hear this.

I was deeply saddened, as well as furious, when I read your original story you posted here.

I'm sure you know how lucky you are. But you may not know. I really could write a book. About a wave of development in front, and then right behind me. And now I sit in a rental house, with my tractors in storage. Not sure where to go. Everything so screwed up with cars and houses. And the prices... But, I walked land yesterday. I'll be 52 soon, and starting from scratch. I did the tent once. And I may be doing it again. But I would be happy. Happier. I suppose we're lucky. Most never see dirt. I loathe the concrete and cars. But that is no way to live. Anyways, this post shouldn't be about me. Most of my posts are. Haha.

I'm just glad you found your way out of the nightmare. Peace.

[peacebird]

50. I hope you find a place in the country Gregorian, we did three years back and

are thrilled every day. We thank God(dess) that we have landed here and laugh at the chickens as they wander about!
:hi:

I just turned 50 and am extremely grateful to have a place where we can grow our veggies and eggs... and just marvel at the deer, bear, coyote, and coons... It is sweet to finally have the life I dreamed of at 20.

[Gregorian]

53. Wow. Thanks.

And you also like biking. I just walked in from a 30 mile mountain bike ride through the redwoods.

I won't know a thing until the realtor gets back from vacation in November. But it's a lot easier this time than my first property purchase.

So you waited thirty years. I guess some of us have to wait. It does me a lot of good to think of someone happy with their home. How nice.

I can only hope the seller takes my low offer.

[jwirr]

13. We called it back to the earth. In the future they will call it survival.

[Fly by night]

27. And for those southern country hippies among us, we've learned that country folks can survive.

Thanks, Bocephus, for reinforcing that folk wisdom.

[JeffR]

14. Thanks for putting this in its own thread

Now, let's get it to the top of the Greatest Page!!

:hippie:

[H2O Man]

15. Nominated, with pride!

I'm a retired psychiatric social worker. I spent decades working with people who had a variety of issues, many relating to unhealthy families life. By that, I do not mean that they were all from "bad" families, though some surely were. But there were various dysfunctions often caused by the shattering of the healthiest family type -- which is the extended family.

I had the privilege of learning a lot from college classrooms, and faculty members that I have the greatest respect for. I also learned from life experience. I can drive from Onondaga, with its Longhouse that once held extended families; to the farms of central NYS, where there are agricultural hamlets that once were home to clusters of extended families; to communities with nice single-family homes, where dad worked in the local factory while mom stayed home; to houses with absentee landlords, which have been sub-divided into 6 apartments to house single parent families.

I've read Daniel Patrick Moynihan's 1965 report on fractured families, and I've read Gary Snyder's "Earth House Hold," about hippies re-defining the concept of family in order to be able to remain sane in an insane society.

I miss my job. But I am glad that I had the opportunity to try to make some people's lives better, by doing things that included many of the lessons that my hippie friends taught me.

[Sal Minella]

16. Peace.

Through many moves, I have kept my Whole Earth catalogues. And my vermicompost is fine, full of happy redworms, and I have taken great pleasure in the company of many folks like you over the years. Keep the faith, baby. Thanks for the post.

[gateley]

17. K&R! nt

[bridgit]

18. love it!! k&r'd...

:kick:

[Yael]

19. Happy to kick and recommend, Bernie

I was not aware of your story. Have read and bookmarked your links. Do you have an update and more importantly, do you need assistance?

Peace

[Fly by night]

23. The feds are still trying to take my farm for less cannabis than they provide each year ...

... to each one of their seven remaining federally "approved" medical cannabis patients. At the time of the raid, I was providing cannabis to four terminally ill patients free of charge (all of whom died within months of the raid). I had done this for seventeen years without ever charging a single sick person for this natural medicine. However, when I refused to sell cannabis to a local dealer (who sold drugs for one of our local judges, who was our drug "kingpin"), the dealer turned me into the TN Marijuana Eradication Task Force. And the rest is history ....

So yes, help (in its many forms) would still be appreciated. Go to www.saveberniesfarm.com and click on "please help". It will give you some suggestions for how you can help stop the medical cannabis madness in this country.

Sending prayers and good vibes in this direction is also always appreciated. As my experience over the past five years has taught me, the only people who likely do not believe in the power of prayer have perhaps never been prayed for.

Every time my Arapaho elder friends in Wyoming held sweat lodges and peyote ceremonies on my behalf before I was locked up, I could smell their sage and cedar on the Western wind.

Thanks kindly.

[Yael]

24. Consider it done, friend.

I will do what I can and am happy to put the word out on your behalf as well. Also a believer in prayer, so you can count on that as well.

Be at peace

[datasuspect]

20. the best aspect of the hippie movement sought authenticity in an authoritarian

system that sought to beat out the individuality and creativity of the majority of people.

i'll take a room full of old hippies over an office full of company men (and women) any day.

[opihimoimoi]

21. As an almoist 70 type...I can dig it.....

[LWolf]

22. .

Yours is a beautiful post. Thank you for sharing, in a gentle and gracious way, some of what has been left behind in the modern culture.

You left me in tears, but they were warm and joyful tears.

[loudsue]

25. You make this old hippy's heart soar....

Yep. We did it. It's all now part & parcel of what is still best about this floundering country of ours. It's the solid foundation we can build from again.

[Fly by night]

26. Thanks kindly, Loudsue. We planted lots of good seeds and, in turn, ...

... were the willing and fertile soil into which the wisdom of the ages (represented within the elders who welcomed us into their midst, and shared their secrets with us) was re-planted.

[King Coal]

30. What a story. I hope you get everything hashed out. I used to love marijuana.

[Fly by night]

34. Things seem to be working out. All the publicity on my case ...

... in the local and national media back in April and May brought out universally positive support for me and for medical marijuana, which I think may have surprised the feds a bit. My story made the front page of the Nashville Tennessean in a Sunday edition. Here's a link to that story which was republished on the Americans for Safe Access web-site:

http://www.safeaccessnow.org/article.php?id=4570

And the "Save Bernie's Farm" benefit sold out, had local TV coverage from the CBS and NBC affiliates and was broadcast (in its four hour entirety) on a local radio station (WRFN: Low Power for the People) -- both on the air and on the Internet.

The two local TV stations also broadcast lead stories on my case (on all their news programs.) I also did a live call-in show on the local (conservative) talk radio station (surreptitiously using one of the pay phones in the halfway house) and got only supportive calls from that conservative audience.

I even had CNN contact me about doing an extended feature. But by that time, I was sent word that if I didn't cool it with the media, my probation was going to be revoked and I was going to be sent to prison. So I cooled it. But CNN has said that if the feds ever take me to court to try to confiscate my farm (something they have not moved forward yet), CNN would be more than happy to cover that trial AND run an extended profile of me ahead of time.

The best thing about all of this is to have my very rural, conservative, church-going community rally around me. Even the Nashville church that I attended while in the halfway house (St. Ann's Episcopal) published information about the benefit in their Sunday bulletin and sent out an email blast to all their parishioners.

If we ever get around to actually honoring the consent of the governed, to actually counting the votes the way they are cast in this country, medical marijuana will be a nationwide reality in a New York minute. That's why even we hippies can't afford to drop out of the political arena these days. There's too much important work that is needed to be accomplished and we long-haired country boys and girls both love hard work for itself and for what comes from it.

As my neighbors would say, if you're waiting on me to start working to save our country,
you're backing up.

[blues90]

28. I added a recommend to this OP .

And kick for what my old bones are still allowed to do .

I brought up the term Hippies not long ago and got bashed to hell and back for it .

Many people today have this twisted vision of what the true hippies ideals were and what out motivation and goals were .

[Cetacea]

29. So close to a revolution that they had to shoot students. n/t

[Swamp Rat]

31. Hippie hugs!

:hug: :grouphug: :hug: :grouphug: :hug: :grouphug: :hug: :grouphug:

[MzNov]

42. WooHoo!

:woohoo: :woohoo:

:bounce: :pals: :loveya:


:hi:


thanks Swamp Rat!

[earth mom]

I really hope you get to keep your farm-there is no justice or humanity in this country otherwise.

:thumbsup:

:hippie:

[Pathwalker]

32. Thank you for this beautiful post. Brought a tear to my eyes.

I will pray for your success at keeping your farm. do they still use Hollerers there? By Grandma was trained as one, and trained me, too.

[Fly by night]

57. My neighbors call their cattle & hogs in for feeding. In the winter, I can hear them at sunset.

Back when I ran cattle myself, I got to be a pretty good "hollerer" myself.

Of course, when you are the oldest of twelve children, you develop a good set of pipes early on.

[upi402]

33. The Hippies were right! k/r n/t

[underpants]

35. That is just so awesome

God I'll bet there are some righteous running trails out there.

:hi:

[Fly by night]

69. I share a two mile border with the Natchez Trace Parkway and am at ...

... the mid-point of a 26 mile horse trail through the woods that is maintained by the park rangers.

If you want a really good run, you can run from Nashville to Natchez, MS on this beautiful scenic two-lane highway. It's just 442 miles long and you just might be the first to run its length (though you would certainly not be the first to walk along what the Indians who lived here before us called the "path of peace".)

[underpants]

80. WOW

I can't imagine how spectacular that is

:hi:

[in_cog_ni_to]

36. GREAT POST, Bernie! I remember your beautiful farm. You are truly blessed to live there.

:kick & R

[UncleSepp]

37. Uh-oh. I think I'm a hippie.

:rofl: This is too funny. Thank you so much for this post. Just the other day I was talking with a customer who was becoming a friend about communities of purpose. One geek to another, we were describing what we were trying to do, and it went a little like this:

Reestablish extended family, with many adults and children, not necessarily related but family all the same.
Reduce duplication of effort and ownership. There are some things that there is no need for every two people to have one of.
Live lightly.
Respect individual differences for the good of the individual and the group. There are some things one person is going to be better at or worse at, enjoy more or enjoy less; trade off to maximize both efficiency and happiness for the individuals and the group.
Learn new ways to resolve conflict that don't involve fighting until one person wins.

We didn't get to finish talking about it, since he was going off to help a friend build a strawbale house and I had to get to the next job. It never would have occurred to me to identify this as a hippie sensibility, and I realize that is because of purely aesthetic considerations. It's funny now, I really ought to have seen it.

:-) :-) Take care!

[f the letter]

38. Recommended

Inspiring story.. i hope i have half your courage when my time comes to stand for what's right.

[triguy46]

39. We're 27 years on a small farm.

Cannot imagine living in town.

[LunaSea]

40. Kicked, Rec'ed and Paypaled!

From your friends in ET.
Thanks

[truedelphi]

41. For any of you in the younger crowd who wanna know

What it really was like, back when we "hippies" were using up all the fun...

There's a wonderful accounting of the back to the land saga, sixties style, embodied in a novel "Eden Express" by Mark Vonnegut (Kurt's son)


Eden Express is one of the purer, richer and more truthful accounts, and very unlike Hollywood version's that usually end up with at least one of the "hippies" going nuts on drugs and being taken out by police.

It gets to the heart of what living on the land can be like - and back in the era, it was necessary not only to do the work on the place, but to have endless discussions - vegan or beef jerky allowed at the table?
Chain saws or old fashioned hand tools to cut the trees?

For just about everything we did back in the day, we spent an equal amount of time figuring out whether one action or another was what we should do.

It is interwoven with the author's bout with schizophrenia (I have heard that later on, Mark ended up taking his life due to the disease -I'm hoping that's not true) so it is not part and parcel the same as anyone else's accounts of that period.

But it is a decent individual's accounting of his coming at age in a time when many of his colleagues were taking on the bullets of the North Vietnamese. Vonnegut is as true to himself as any of his father's heroes are, and as down to earth, rugged and sweet a person as you could want for yoruself in a "roomie" and housemate.

[Cronopio]

46. Happy to say that Mark Vonnegut is alive and well.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Vonnegut

Have to second your recommendation of "Eden Express" - an excellent book. It saddened me to hear that Kurt partially blamed himself at first for his son's manic-depression, even though he knew there was nothing he could have done to prevent it. It showed what a loving, sensitive man Kurt really was at heart.

[truedelphi]

47. Wow you've sorta cycled an awful weekend back to a more

Hopeful one.

That is most excellent!

[democrank]

43. Nominated with great joy.

Your post was truly a joy to read. Many thanks.

Nothing, no amount of money could buy what I have learned by not selling out. I taught myself how to patch up a hole in my old Subaru with some sheet metal, a pattern made out of a paper bag and a rivet gun. I dug scrap metal out of a dump and taught myself what aluminum $$$$ extrusions are. I`ve cut down my own firewood with a bow saw. One thing I know for sure....no matter how bad it gets out there, I`m going to survive.

~PEACE~

[Raksha]

44. K & R - absolutely beautiful!

Thank you for posting this.

[Cronopio]

45. This is the kicker for me.

"The drug agents phoned around and discovered that not only was Ellis not a known criminal, he was a known good guy, highly respected in the community. At some point, much to Ellis’ surprise, the Task Force officers just scratched their heads and left."

So the illegality wasn't the motivation for them, but the likelihood that they could smear you in the local community.

And they didn't take the fact of your good name as a challenge? The bastards are becoming lazy these days.


"“They kept saying they’d never encountered anything like me,” Ellis recalls. “They said, ‘No one has anything negative to say about you.’”

Yeah, I'm sure that lack of impersonal animosity in the populace still doesn't quite compute for them.

Major kudos to you for disappointing them, Mr. Ellis. You are what I wish *all* of America was like.

[Triana]

48. WHAT a story! Peace and Health to you, Fly by Night! K & R

Thanks for sharing your wonderful story!

[w8liftinglady]

49. I wish I could have been a hippie

I can't find anyone that thinks like I do in this red county.You guys had it right.

[BrklynLiberal]

51. Thank you Fly By Night....

:thumbsup: :hi: :hug:

[L0oniX]

52. I lived on Hate street 2 blocks up the hill from Ashberry and yep we were right but...

a lot of us turned our backs on most of the ideals we had and became what we hated then; plastic people, corporate and government corruption, etc.

:hippie:

[Fly by night]

54. Thanks, everyone, for the Ks & Rs & good vibes today.

I really didn't expect this kind of reaction when I posted this thread this morning. Thanks to all of you for all of this.

I've just left a group of old and new friends sitting around a bonfire under a half moon, drumming and chanting and generally being here now. I've watched a mother dance and a beautiful young(er than me) female yoga master chant and a grandmother smile; I've listened to men read their poetry and admire each other's cooking; I've sat and smiled and eaten many flavors of late fall. I've heard a friend say (to the entire group), "It's so nice to see Bernie this evening" and heard the group laugh when I answered "it is nice to be seen."

Hippies love and live and laugh and labor mightily (for small and large purposes), with a big smile (legal and otherwise) on their faces. They changed themselves, their families, their communities and our world. And they're still changing everything -- within and without and around themselves -- today.

So let's keep celebrating who we were and who we are and whoever we want to be.

Wherever we are.

Right now, and forever.

Thanks again, guys. It has been a beautiful autumn day at the end of the road in my deep hollow home. Thanks to a world view built on four decades of benefits that came from moving back to the land, and to my acquaintance with so many country-loving patriots here at DU, I am one happy puppy tonight, secure in the knowledge that I am one of my communities' favorite felons.

It is all good.

[Swamp Rat]

55. Me too.

I just got back from band rehearsal, which consisted of drumming on a Mississippi River levee in New Orleans. :)

It's all good. ;)

[eridani]

56. Reminds me of a science fiction story published 20 years ago--

--in which Amish and old hippies aid in recovery after some worldwide disaster. Remembered quote "If you don't like hippies, the next time you're hungry call a cop."

You are being joined by a new wave--see Barbara Kingsolver's new book Animal, Vegetable, Miracle.

[tabasco]

58. I suppose we can give up hope for rational drug laws in our lifetimes.

There are a lot of really great people who are also felons because of our stupid, cowardly lawmakers.

I wish I could move to Holland. Pot is great for my PTSD, but I can't use it anymore. I got caught too.

Thanks for all you do and best wishes.

[dpbrown]

59. What an incredible inspiration

I always wondered why I collected the Foxfire books and learned about Square Foot Gardening after getting to know my local hippie well in college. He came to college to get a degree to learn how to grow pot better.

Now I know. I was too young for the real hippie years of the 60s, but I've always felt a pull to be one with the land and to "conserve" the commons, the environment, and the extended family. It's an inspiration to know that some are doing it so successfully.

[bleever]

60. God bless you, Fly by night.

Thank you for this.

[Maat]

61. To the Hippies!

They were right all along.

I graduated high school in 1976, so the hippies were my older "brothers and sisters" (they taught me so much)!

There was probably a 25-30-year gap between the first round of protests and the second, but I'm back in gear in my late 40's!

:toast:

What they taught me ... well, they were right all along!

BLESSINGS TO YOU, BERNIE!!

:hug:

[ooglymoogly]

62. It is wonderful to meet the heroes of my generation and see them standing tall

Will paypal on payday.
Yes its time to spend some time in the garden.
The orange figs and lemon trees and non hardy stuff has to come inside and be grouchy for the winter.

On an upbeat note; It looks as though the gods are smiling on you and your run of bad luck appears to have almost run its course. kr for exposure

[DemReadingDU]

63. morning kick

This is my daughter, she is only in her 30's, but she has always been a hippie.

[llmart]

64. Here's another morning kick...................

from a 58-year old hippie wannabe (back in the day).

Let's get back the honest image of hippies instead of the one the media foisted on us back when Reagan turned the sheep into rabid consumerists.

[liberal N proud]

65. k&r

[bcoylepa]

66. good morning

from a fellow traveler - loved hearing your story
moved to the country with a dozen friends in 1974 - the week Nixon resigned- after a college prof gave me a copy of the Nearing's book Living the Good Life
33 years later - still in love - still growing our own food
the friends have all moved away - most come back to visit now and then - the trees are taller and beavers have built an amazing pond on the property
Most people in the area vote against their own self interest but we have found community around these hills - and celebrate the solstice together and have volleyball and barn dances and pot lucks throughout the year
my children were born in our home and we've buried three relatives out back
I have been lucky to be Living the Good Life
working with you all for peace and justice and a sustainable community

[Fly by night]

67. The Nearings changed many of our lives for the better.

It was good to learn from them just what it took to leave "civilization", and good jobs, and running water and "instant" heat and all those other things we thought we couldn't live (in comfort) without -- to strike out on their own and to make such a peaceful and influential life for themselves.

It was also good to read about abiding love, a love between two people who were somewhat different to start (the age span between them for one thing) but who grew to be one with their home, their community and each other.

It was perhaps best to read through the Nearings' books that our own late '60s "back to the land" movement was nothing new, just the latest wave of pastoral sanity that flows through our country every so often.

So for those of you who have read or posted on this thread but who have not made your move to the country (though you've dreamed of if for years), this is your wake-up call. Time to get up, stand up, stand up for your life.

Go buy the several books by the Nearings, find some of the old organic gardening books of J.I. Rodale, look through the National Geographics for the year 1970 (an article on the Hutterites then helped me cement my move to the country) and PM any of the posters on this thread who have gone to the country before you. We'd all be happy to help.

Oh what a beautiful morning. The rain is falling gently on my tin roof, I'll go naked to the garden with my quart of hot coffee in hand and spread ryegrass seed in the newly exposed dark earth before a hot bath, and then I'll start thinking about adding some to the firewood pile.

I am glad to be here. You can be here too -- now. (Or soon.)

Peace.

Your garden awaits.

[Fly by night]

70. My long last hippie good-bye

Thanks so much to everyone for K&Ring and commenting on this "hippies" thread. I am so tickled (and humbled) by the positive response it received here on DU, and for the joyful memories that it helped spark in so many of you fellow DUers. If it also helped some in our midst actually move forward toward their own lifelong dreams of moving to the country, we will all be blessed.

The thread will fade into the DU woodwork shortly but, like all good hippies, I hope it leaves a lingering sweet and musky scent behind.

Sage and cedar.

Mi tak qui asi (Phonetic Sioux for "all my relations")

Peace. Fly by night (Bernie Ellis)

[prairierose]

71. Thanks for starting this conversation...

I don't say much here and I am happy to say that I live in place where hippies are not denigrated all of the time. When I hear those comments about dirty hippies, I feel like I am in a time warp. I did not understand the animosity then and I do not understand it now.

I am trying to get back to the land again. I need to be out away from people and be quiet and feel the earth.I never bought into the consumer driven life and believe that I have been much happier for it

Someday, more might see the value of less and the value of creation rather than endless consumption.

Peace and love and harmony

[H2O Man]

72. Great thread!

Thank you for posting it!

[Fly by night]

74. Now that's a sweat lodge I would love to pray in.

What a healthy pile of old men (sweat-stones) you have. Good on ya'.

[H2O Man]

75. Now that would

be something I would enjoy, as well. If I get out next spring, I may stop in that dinner for a cup of coffee.

[sagetea]

73. I grew up on a "Commune"...

In Northeastern Nevada,We were lucky, and had geothermal water that heated our house and green house. We also had an outside bathtub,LOL.My favorite memory is coming home from school in winter and going out to the greenhouse and eating a fresh tomato.Ten years ago, however, it all came apart, and people moved on, one of the owners is still there, and still people come to rest there.I am now 40 years old, and just bought property in Idaho with the intent to continue this way of life,for the future of my daughter,and nieces and nephews. I truly believe it is necessary for our future generations to be able to live in tribal or communal societies as that may be how the future will lay itself out.

[Ghost in the Machine]

76. K&R! - Here's another thing hippies can do

Here's what else hippies can do:
What is the Farm?
A: The Farm community is a cooperative enterprise of families and friends living on three square miles in southern middle Tennessee. We started the Farm in the hope of establishing a strongly cohesive, outwardly-directed community, a base from which we could, by action and example, have a positive effect on the world as a whole.

The Farm is a human scale, full featured settlement founded by Stephen Gaskin, and 320 San Francisco hippies in 1971 as an experiment in sustainable, developmentally progressive human habitat. Being 'full featured,' it has all of the usual implements of village life--grocery store, medical clinic, filling station, schools, water systems, pharmacy, post office, cemetery, and scores of businesses and residences. Being 'sustainable,' it attempts--in all aspects--to harmlessly integrate human activities into the natural world in a way that is supportive of healthy human development and can be successfully continued into the indefinite future. Being 'developmentally progressive,' it has a history of constantly pushing the envelope of what is economically feasible or even possible. While failures are an integral part of the experimental process, The Farm's successes are numerous and dramatic.

Among ourselves we try to use agreement and mutual respect to generate a friendly working environment. We recognize that there are many paths toward realizing personal ideals and that people have a wide range of individual social values, but as a group, we do not accept the use of violence, anger or intimidation for solving problems. The fabric of our community is created by our friendship and respect for one another, and for our land. The institutions we have developed to organize our community have changed over the years and will probably change more. The Farm is not really what we are doing--it is how we are currently doing it. It is a process, rather than an end-result.

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Where is the Farm?
The Farm was settled near Summertown on 1750 acres of rolling hilltops in the poorest county in rural Tennessee. It is 30 miles from the nearest hospital, 50 miles from the nearest interstate highway, and 75 miles from the nearest major city. It is also 35 miles from the birthplace of the Ku Klux Klan. The early community settlement was built entirely from salvaged, recycled and local materials. A $1 road grader cut the roads. A $1 railroad tower provided the public water supply. Scrapped schoolbuses and army tents provided shelter from below-zero temperatures until the sawmill could begin milling native oak and salvage crews could harvest old tobacco barns, factories, and condemned houses. On a budget of $1 per person per day and no grants, no food stamps, and no welfare, the 320 original settlers bought the land, erected the buildings, and became agriculturally self-sufficient within 4 years.

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Why Tennessee?
In the mid - 1960s, many people went through a cultural change that took them away from their roots and cast them adrift, searching for something better. Disillusioned by the Vietnam War, disturbed by increasing violence and injustice in the nation, encouraged by the successes of the Civil Rights and other movements, and empowered by the strength of their numbers, many gravitated toward the West Coast, looking for alternatives. A hysterical nation reacted to the Hippies by pursuing them in their homes and workplaces and locking them up in prison, where many remain today. In 1970, a caravan of more than 300 of us left California to start an experimental community where our ideals could find expression in our daily lives. At $70 an acre, Tennessee gave us access to a large amount of land at an affordable price.

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What are our religious beliefs?
The Farm is a nondenominational church. We like to call ourselves 'free thinkers,' because we discuss religion and philosophy in terms that do not exclude any possibilities. People come to the Farm from a variety of religious traditions and disciplines and find those views treated with honor and respect. While individual practices may vary, our group practice is an on-going, free-ranging discussion. We consider ourselves to be a spiritual community. In keeping with our deep reverence for life, we are pacifists, conscientious objectors, and most of us are vegetarians. On Sunday mornings many of us like to gather for group meditation and church services out in the meadow.

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How is the community managed?
All members of The Farm are expected to contribute to the financial upkeep of the community through their earnings. Since our community operates like a small town, it has some of the same needs. We maintain our own roads, municipal buildings, and public water system. Community policies are arbitrated and implemented through an elected board. Important questions are discussed at town meetings and decided by community votes. We don't always reach complete consensus, but we generally try to have a high level of agreement in everything we decide.

http://www.thefarmcommunity.com/About%20Us/6`FAQ.aspx

[duhneece]

77. You help me stand a little taller, feel a little prouder

I live out in the boonies, heat with a wood-burning stove (although I confess I want, but can't afford, propane). I have gone years not smoking marijuana, but have always believed it to be safer than alcohol or antidepressants. I've worked with HIV positive New Mexicans and cancer patients and went to Santa Fe to speak before the Dept of Health for medical marijuana because my experience proved to me how helpful it is. Still , I have felt bad for using it. Especially since my son is now in prison for meth-related crimes. I'm getting tired of struggling to keep up with wood cutting and dealing with water issues, but after reading your post, I feel a little stronger. Maybe I need to find a way to invite others to share my beautiful canyon and help me start a mineral bath business, which is my dream, but I feel too overwhelmed to do much for it.
Thank you again for helping me feel better about my life. I am just so sorry you had to get caught up in the legal war against marijuana.

[Yellow Horse]

78. I was just a tad too young to be a REAL Hippie, but oohhhh how I wanted to be...

A kick for Fly By Night from your wannabe hippy chick pal, now chasing bad voting machines instead of making plans to become a professional folk singer when she grows up.

;-)

[johnaries]

79. Also, in TN, The Farm started by that old hippie Stephen Gaskin.

Thriving community

http://www.thefarm.org/

[GreenTea]

81. "The hippies were right all along -- we knew that"

Go ahead, name your movement. Name something good and positive and pro-environment and eco-friendly that's happening in the newly "greening" of America and don't say more guns in Texas or fewer reproductive choices for women because that would defeat the whole point of this perky little column and destroy its naive tone of happy rose-colored optimism. OK?

I'm talking about, say, energy-efficient lightbulbs. I'm looking at organic foods going mainstream. I mean chemical-free cleaning products widely available at Target and I'm talking saving the whales and protecting the dolphins. I mean yoga studios flourishing in every small town, giant boxes of organic cereal at Costco and the Toyota Prius becoming the nation's oddest status symbol. You know, good things.

Look around: We have entire industries devoted to recycled paper, a new generation of cheap solar-power technology and an Oscar for "An Inconvenient Truth." Even the soulless corporate monsters over at famously heartless joints like Wal-Mart are now claiming that they really, really care about saving the environment because, well, "it's the right thing to do" (read: "It's purely economic and all about their bottom line").

There is but one conclusion you can draw from the astonishing pro-environment sea change happening in the culture and (reluctantly, nervously) in the halls of power in D.C., one thing we must all acknowledge in our wary, jaded, globally warmed universe: The hippies had it right all along.

All this hot enthusiasm for healing the planet and eating whole foods and avoiding chemicals and working with nature and developing the self? Came from the hippies. Alternative health? Hippies. Green cotton? Hippies. Reclaimed wood? Recycling? Humane treatment of animals? Medical pot? Alternative energy? Natural childbirth? Non-GMA seeds? It came from the granola types (who, of course, absorbed much of it from ancient cultures), from the alternative worldviews, from the underground and the sidelines and from far off the grid and it's about time the media, the politicians, the culture as a whole sent out a big, hemp-covered apology.

Here's a suggestion, from one of my more astute ex-hippie readers: Instead of issuing carbon credits so industrial polluters can clear their collective corporate conscience, maybe, to help offset all the damage they've done to the soul of the planet all these years, these commercial cretins should instead buy some karma credits from the former hippies themselves. You know, from those who've been working for the health of the planet, quite thanklessly, for 50 years and who have, as a result, built up quite a storehouse of good karma. You think?

Of course, you can easily argue that much of the "authentic" hippie ethos -- the anti-corporate ideology, the sexual liberation, the anarchy, the push for civil rights, the experimentation -- has been totally leached out of all these new movements, that corporations have forcibly co-opted and diluted every single technology and humble pro-environment idea and Ben & Jerry's ice cream cone and Odwalla smoothie to make them both palatable and profitable. But does this somehow make the organic oils in that body lotion any more harmful? Verily, it does not.

You might also just as easily claim that much of the nation's reluctant turn toward environmental health has little to do with the hippies per se, that it's taking the threat of global meltdown combined with the notion of really, really expensive ski tickets to slap the nation's incredibly obese butt into gear and force consumers to wake up to the gluttony and wastefulness of American culture as everyone starts wondering, "Oh my God, what's going to happen to swimming pools and NASCAR and free shipping from Amazon?" Of course, without the '60s groundwork, without all the radical ideas and seeds of change planted nearly five decades ago, what we'd be turning to in our time of need would be a great deal more hopeless indeed.

But if you're really bitter and shortsighted, you could say the entire hippie movement overall was just incredibly overrated, gets far too much cultural credit for far too little actual impact, was pretty much a giant excuse to slack off and enjoy dirty, lazy, responsibility-free sex romps and do a ton of drugs and avoid Vietnam and not bathe for a month and name your child Sunflower or Shiva Moon or Chakra Lennon Sapphire Bumblebee. This is what's called the reactionary simpleton's view. It blithely ignores history, perspective, the evolution of culture as a whole. You know, just like America.

But, you know, whatever. The proof is easy enough to trace. The core values and environmental groundwork laid by the '60s counterculture are still so intact and potent that even the stiffest neocon Republican has to acknowledge their extant power. It's all right there: Treehugger.com is the new '60s underground hippie zine. Ecstasy is the new LSD. Visible tattoos are the new longhairs. And bands as diverse as Pearl Jam, Bright Eyes, NIN and the Dixie Chicks are writing anti-Bush, anti-war songs for a new, ultra-jaded generation.

And, oh yes, speaking of good ol' MDMA (Ecstasy), even drug culture is getting some new respect. Staid old Time mag just ran a rather snide little story about the new studies being conducted by Harvard and the National Institute of Mental Health into the astonishing psycho-spiritual benefits of goodly entheogens such as LSD, psilocybin and MDMA. Unfortunately, the piece basically backhands Timothy Leary and the entire "excessive," "naive" drug culture of yore in favor of much more "sane" and "careful" scientific analysis happening now, as if the only valid methods for attaining knowledge and an understanding of spirit were through control groups and clinical, mysticism-free examination. Please.

Still, the fact that serious scientific research into entheogens is being conducted even in the face of the most anti-science, pro-pharmaceutical, ultraconservative presidential regime in recent history is proof enough that all the hoary hippie mantras about expanding the mind and touching God through drugs were onto something after all (yes, duh). Tim Leary is probably smiling wildly right now -- though that might be because of all the mushrooms he's been sharing with Kerouac and Einstein and Mary Magdalene. Mmm, heaven.

Of course, true hippie values mean you're not really supposed to care about or attach to any of this, you don't give a damn for the hollow ego stroke of being right all along, for slapping the culture upside the head and saying, "See? Do you see? It was never about the long hair and the folk music and Woodstock and taking so much acid you see Jesus and Shiva and Buddha tongue kissing in a hammock on the Dog Star, nimrods."

It was, always and forever, about connectedness. It was about how we are all in this together. It was about resisting the status quo and fighting tyrannical corporate/political power and it was about opening your consciousness and seeing new possibilities of how we can all live with something resembling actual respect for the planet, for alternative cultures, for each other. You know, all that typical hippie junk no one believes in anymore. Right?

Mark Morford's column appears Wednesdays and Fridays in Datebook and on SFGate.com. E-mail him at [e-mail].

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/05/02/DDG1UPIHBB1.DTL&hw=hippies+right&sn=001&sc=1000

[Fly by night]

82. I just sent Morford a link to this thread. Hope to get his reaction.

If so, I'll post it here.

[lonestarnot]

83. Hope you live near water.

LOL :toast:

[Heidi]

84. Kick

for those who may have missed this thread.

:kick:

[Fly by night]

85. Thanks, Heidi. Old hippies (and their threads) never die, ...

... they just become $10 quilts.

Five inches of rain here in the last two days, with more to come. We really need it.

The leaves are changing and the garden is getting made ready for a winter that might come.

The Goddess is in Her heaven, and it's right here. Peace.

[Ghost in the Machine]

86. Here's another kick for hippies everywhere!

[Cookie wookie]

87. Queen of the hippies checking in.

Spent those years in Southern California -- those were the days.

Ah Rain. Can feel your garden sigh all the way from here.

We're going to be out of water soon. Hard to fathom, so to speak.