32 Tomorrow may rain so I'll follow the Sun Part 3

Ok, boring. Yeah, the air was dirty. The water was full of chemicals, bubbly and oily. The streets had litter. The clothing was colorful. The cars were cool. The buildings were dumpy and falling down. The waterways and empty lots were filled with garbage of all kinds. There was less plastic though and the people were less plastic too. Just like 70's movies.

Along the Hudson

The day arrived. I don't remember the details of when I got there. People weren't thinking "Gee. I should keep track of every little thing so that 50 years later I could tell a precise account." That's not how we thought. We were really worried about the future. A lot of people thought the world would have ended by now and I was one of them. Well, I guess I got there pretty damn early since I was one of the workers. Now what was I doing? They handed me an armband and said "Ok. Go stand inside the barricade over there. Keep people from coming inside. "What? Look at me. Am I supposed to tackle them when they mob the barricade? "Just stop them." Ok. I'm pretty damn tough. I'll stop them.

I was positioned right near the stage. Who knows why? Ok. It was before things got really crowded. Pete Seeger showed up and hurriedly went to talk to someone in the important group by the stage. Big deal to me. "Where Have All The Flowers Gone." "If I Had A Hammer." "Turn, Turn, Turn." These songs meant so much to the "movement" back then. He got up and sang a couple of songs. He was leaving. He had on his cap, I remember that. As he was walking out of the barricades I went to him. Told him who knows what the hell and shook his hand. That puts me in one or two degrees of separation from a lot of cool people. In awe. I guess he took his boat down to Washington DC to speak.

Maybe there are people with clear memories of when the speakers started. I don't remember those things. I barely remember watching any of them even though they were right near me. It was all so strange and surreal and I was freaking out about keeping people out. There wasn't too much trouble with that except for a damn photographer from France. I tried keeping him out but he pushed right passed me. I don't know where he went. Hopefully he got some good photos. But where are they? In a box somewhere? How many times can I say that not everything out there made it's way online.

I don't remember eating or peeing. Food was not the glorious idol it is now. You shoved something down your throat and went on about your business. Let's see. I don't remember Ali McGraw at all. I honestly only vaguely remember Paul Newman. It's kind of weird but I remember that Leonard Bernstein gave a good speech. I felt was an honor to see Margaret Mead speak. I remember Ed Koch because I thought we was rather strange looking, like a cartoon. A caricature. Mayor Lindsay... boy oh boy... I vaguely remember Paul Newman but Mayor John Lindsay. I couldn't help but look at him. Not necessarily like I was in love with him, but I am a people watcher. I like to stare and observe and he had that hard to describe charisma. He must have emanated a powerful aura. He spoke at the library with Kurt Vonnegurt, but he made it down to Union Square too. I swear I remember seeing Vonnegurt. That's a haze though, like a lot of things that long ago.

There were enormous amounts of people. That was that. Earth Day was over and next I did a little bit of stuff locally. I worked with a super smart dude at school to get a group going at my high school called STEP. Students To End Pollution. Dorky huh? We did a lot of nagging & it succeeded in getting a county wide recycling program started. I never did the things like "pictures" in high school. Not in the group photo, but it's listed by my name in the stupid yearbook.

When it was all said and done, it did make a difference. Nixon set up the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and signed the Clean Air Act. The Clean Water Act was eventually signed by bipartisan effort. Do you believe that? There were also considerations given to prices and inflation by compromise. What a concept. Things took a while to clean up but over a little bit of time the progress has been incredible.

I had a button like this.

30 Tomorrow may rain so I'll follow the Sun Part 1

I can get a few dates a little off, but this one is set in stone. April 22, 1970 was the first Earth Day and I was part of it. Not just attending the rally but I was part of a small group of volunteers that did work for the Environmental Action Committee in New York City. This was not a large "non-profit" with a big machine behind it, like things are nowadays. This was a very small office. I think I remember one desk with some file cabinets and some chairs. I never saw a bunch of people because you'd go in there and get an assignment and leave. I only ever saw the long haired dude that I met in the park and the Bernadine Dohrn looking chick that sat at the desk. All the female activists looked like Bernadine back then.

Sure, I walked around with my copy of Silent Spring but I just want to say that pollution in the early 70's was beyond belief. Especially if you lived near a large city. There were oil and chemicals being dumped in the waterways. I remember the smoke stacks along the Jersey Turnpike spewing out all kinds of smells. The creek that I swam in when I was like four or five years old, had creeping oil slicks on it by then. It is so, so much cleaner in the US now. It's other parts of the world that really need to work on it now.

New York

Cleveland

But the cars were great

It was the winter and spring days before April 22. I'd go into the office every weekend and get my assignment. God if I remember where it was. I should have written this stuff decades ago. My father wanted me to write a book in the 70's, but I was still having a good time.

Maybe sometimes I went alone, but my assignments were almost always alone. They split us up to get the most coverage. I was sent to areas mostly in the Lower East Side of Manhattan. I spent my days cheerfully handing out flyers about pollution. New Yorkers would possibly take them while walking very fast, glance at it and then throw them on the ground. They really needed those anti-litter campaigns. People didn't give it much thought. Lots of stuff thrown out car windows. The difference though was that everything was some form of paper or cardboard, not all the plastic crap today. There was some chance it would decompose.

So I'd take a minute or two every so often and go pick up the paper. Sometimes I'd hand them out & sometimes I'd throw them away. No recycling. But I just want to say a lot of people were nice, even though they were in a big hurry. On occasion someone would stop and talk. Usually a very interesting character. Many times an older person that lived a long life and wanted to share some of their knowledge. I was always willing to listen and learn something from them. People were honestly more colorful then. All the way around. Their clothing, their language and their thought. When did this all change? A little editorial here... we are turning into homogenized gray boxes. Just like the new constructions and the cars. Why are cars such bland colors now? Maybe we'd be a little happier if there was a little color in things nowadays. Open up some discussion.

The long haired dude was really tall. He'd check in on us and talk for a few minutes. I'm not very tall. If I stand up straight maybe 5'4". But I really had to bend my neck to look up at him or maybe it just seemed like that. I was in awe of his fire. He was really sparked with dedication or maybe he was on speed. I don't know. He had a lot of fiery speech that was more expletive than dictionary words. "Wow," I thought to myself, "Can I mimic this way of speech? I need to convey enthusiasm." Alas, I must always be me. A few here and there but just not to that degree. Even with all that coaching from the Golden twins.

One day I was handed a clipboard with a petition on it. I don't remember what it was about but I can tell you that at that time people that tried to get petitions signed were actually interested in the subject matter, cared about it and were volunteers. You still run into that, I guess, but most of the time, I believe, people are are paid by whatever special interest. This was a much harder job than handing out flyers.