There's been some things bothering me about the blog. I'm trying to make it a little easy for people to read. Kind of skimming over a few things so they don't seem too bad. If you go back to how I ended this portion of the story, I did mention how radical some of the people I associated were. I probably will continue to do this to some extent. I'm small potatoes, but it's just the cumulative variety.
I don't need to go into all the thought of the times. The time and the place. Maybe just the time. Maybe just the place. Some of us believed in extremes. Some of us were more moderate and were peaceniks. Kind of where I fell. Believe it or not it used to be a thing to carry around Mao's Little Red Book. I think about that now and I can't believe it. Other people had one so I said, let me see that. I was just hanging around. I was young but so were they. There was never anything organized but a few people had a few weapons in the trunks of the few cars. I remember laying around like usual & some of them (them, always guys) were spraying mace into each others face to get used to the feel. We were small potatoes though. Just so you know it was there. (It's really been boring for a couple of decades. Forgive me for that thought but look through history. It's been really mild for a while.) I knew on a superficial level a guy that blew out an eye and most of his fingers fooling around with stuff. His was mostly a criminal enterprise however. This was not uncommon. It was not shocking. There were a hell of a lot of people crammed into a small area. There were many different kinds of people I ran into. These are just a few examples. There were many more.
Instead I did work for Vietnam Veterans Against The War. Went around door to door petitioning with a smart kid. Stuff like that. Not everyone was receptive. I did crash a couple of fancy Long Island rich lady fundraising events. They enjoyed my company and I liked their food. We had Ron Kovic speak at the high school with all kinds of people with varying opinions. Opinions from many sides. Let's see... Ron Kovic, a Black Panther, a John Bircher, other veteran's groups, all kinds of religious people. We wanted to hear it all.
I think everyone calmed it a bit during Watergate and after the troops were pulled out of Vietnam. A lot of them ended up who knows where. I do know of a couple people that became teachers. Some died. Some went to jail. Some moved and were never heard from again (me.) Yup. But they calmed down. There was and is such a group consciousness thing. Weird how things turn in big waves. The one thing I am grateful for was Freedom of Speech. It gave people the ability to exchange ideas. With the ability to speak and exchange ideas, I think I really thought pretty deeply about things. It didn't take long at all for me to realize what a piece of crap Mao was. Anyway, I figured out I wasn't about politics. I don't like it. Too many conflicts. "Free your mind instead." If we curtail speech and ideas how's that gonna happen?
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