20 Oh, take your time, don't live too fast Part 1

This is going to be a story about a personal challenge that I made good on. Now, I may repeat myself on some happenings in these stories. I'm not going to go back and check what I already wrote. 

After I left Charlotte's, I was hell bent on joining in on some of the fun stuff that was going on around me. I already had hit on some of the drugs. Mostly just smoky stuff. Pot and hash. Ok, good. I thought to myself. Jesus, the 60's are almost over. I've had some dumb kid boyish friends but I want some real man-woman love. Gotta happen in 1969. 

When I went over to any of my girl friend's houses, we did a lot of the regular things. Smoke a little pot, but it would depend who it was. Listen to music. Walk around. We did talk about things we wanted to do. Maybe I was a little off because I always wanted more weird things to happen. But it also seems a lot of my friends had older brothers. People had more kids then and especially since a lot of my friends were derelicts from Catholic School. Most families had four kids but some families had 11 or 13 kids. Really devout. I had to listen to crap like Joni Mitchell or Simon and Garfunkel in the girls' rooms, but I heard this heavy sound coming from the boys rooms. I turned on the radio at home. It wasn't the first time I heard Blue Cheer or Iron Butterfly. In fact, the lifeguards at Oceanside Pool let me in their special room because I had good 45's. That was mostly in 1967 and 1968. 

I couldn't sit there and listen to Joni Mitchell for hours and stare at the album covers. If the mom was home, she was usually ironing or something. It ran the gamut with Catholic moms. Some, for God's sake, went to church everyday. Those were the kind that had 11 kids and were completely downtrodden. They had to go to the supermarket constantly because of the amount of the food they needed for all the kids. There were some moms though, that kind of looked like mob moms and weren't always home. It happened on occasion I ended up listening to music with the brothers, not only because of the music, but because the boys liked to plan pranks and talk about how dumb some stuff was. Funny banter. The whole boy girl thing was so much different back then. Boys played outside and were a little wild. They did more funny things. Girls were supposed to learn to cook and be obedient. This was 1969, I'm not exaggerating. You see movies about hippies, but the future was drearily planned out for everyone. This was "pre Stepford Wives" movie. No matter their sex. It's not the same now. Some things are good. Some things are bad. So I ended up talking to a lot of boys. Really, my main focus was talking or pranks.

So one of my friends, who I ended up doing Earth Day stuff in 1970 with, had an older brother I didn't see much. Maybe on the weekends. How do I introduce him? All I can say is hippie god. He kind of looked like Clint Eastwood but with long hair. He wore a fringe jacket all the time and he was built like Clint Eastwood too. The kind of muscle you get from work and from fighting. New York hippies were different from California hippies, in my opinion. This girl, JM, had two older brothers and all the kids were sent to work the cranberry bogs in Massachusetts during the summer. They were pretty tough. The father was a Merchant Marine and he was a scary dude. Very weathered look. Tattoos weren't commonplace, just pretty much sailors. Those green drawings on his arms were fascinating to me. So wow. He'd come home from his time out there on the ocean and be looking for a fight. Both boys had regular fist fights with him. A lot of dads back then did that to teach their sons how to be men. I saw a lot of fist fights growing up. I can tell you that when friends tangle you know it's going to be brutal. A lot of pent up things going on.

I used to do a lot of things by myself. I like to observe and enjoy things. I learned that it can be a pain to be in a group of people because they usually "wanted to go." It was easy enough for me to jump on the bus and take it to Long Beach. If I did have someone with me that was cool, we'd hitchhike. I hitchhiked all the time. The only time I did it by myself though was when I was living up Ute Pass in Colorado in the 80's. I went to Long Beach to hang out on the boardwalk. All the old attractions and rides. Everything dilapidated. There were always people there. Sometimes I would sit and talk to some of the old people that walked the Boardwalk. I loved to hear stories of their life. Lots of hippies too. One girl would pay me to go on that ride "Loop O Plane." A capsule thing that went upside down. She'd get really drunk and give me a dollar every time I went on it with her. She puked once, but thank god it was when we got off.

It was like out of "Spill the Wine," but that song hadn't even come out yet. "Out of the middle came a lady. She whispered in my ear, something crazy." But a guy. If you can imagine a hippie god in a fringe jacket, with the ocean breezes blowing through his hair." 🤣 Just like a rock and roll video. (Which also hasn't had its time yet.)

Not a hippie, but a god in a fringe jacket

He sat himself down. We already knew each other but vaguely. So I guess you could say the die was cast.

Ok. It wasn't this bad, but maybe like this a little bit.

 

 

42 Meet me by the grapes made of rubies

I wasn't planning on writing stories purely about any sexual encounters, but it may be unavoidable. This one I really can't leave out. It's pretty good. It's not going to be erotic or anything. Probably funny. You might think I'm going to write about an orgy or something along those lines. But you know what? Both of my best friends were busy with those. I was just this out of place hippie girl stuck in dirty, old New York.

There was my friend "I" that you've heard a few things about, but I also had a friend "S." Yup. Another Catholic school girl. Now "I" was the poetic type dreaming about the life of Isadora Duncan. But "S" was the street smart type. She headed down a hard road pretty young.

Not her, but looked like this. With black hair.

Ha ha. Definitely not us but she wore a coat like the one on the right.

So while I was taking mescaline and breathing the flowers, the both of them took the train into the city on weekends. I did too but separately. All different worlds. I was like that. I floated between a few. They felt obliged, it seems, to take part in orgies and the like. Sure, good. I was just crying because I found a stick with a lonely leaf in the gutter. A few people never forgot that. "S" got in with a group and started doing smack. It was like she hated it but did it anyway. She was still living at home, but only made it home on occasion. I'd go over when she was there and if you ever wanted to hear arguments in foul language, this was the place. All these Catholic moms had out of control kids. Mrs. C would be ironing and look at me. I just shrugged. I smiled a lot so they all thought I was wholesome.

I liked to smell the flowers.

Where's my story? Here it is. I liked nature, what I could find. I also tried to find good in people. But it was the early 70's and I was completely out of control too. I talked before how I loved to go to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. That's where this rendezvous took place.

🤣🤣

So I went there with a fella. Walking around & looking at stuff. That place is pretty big and has some amazing stuff. I haven't been there in forever though.

Ok. Here it goes. We probably were high on weed or something light. Who remembers? Maybe nothing? I don't remember. I do remember how it usually started out. I'd feel a hand go down my back and somehow land on my ass, and further. Boy, nobody could control themselves. So we ended up leaning against a wall, really heavily making out. Oh, I did know him too. What are we going to do? We can't stop. Crap. I can't find the floor plans from the 70's.

Not him, but a 70's guy in the museum.

So we were near some kind of exit hallway away from the main room we were in.  Let's go here. Yeah. Against the wall. I had my pants mostly down and we were having a "romantic interlude" in a hallway at the museum. We were going at it for a bit when all of a sudden I see a security guard, open the door and look at us. I said "Oh no. There's a security guard." 😼 My partner said "Fuck him. Let him watch." I said, "but..." But we kept going. The security guard just stood there. Looking at us. Not saying anything. But he left after a bit. Just went away. We finished. Pulled up our pants and went back into the main room. The security guard was nowhere to be seen. Wow. Somewhere there was a security guard with the same but opposite story. 🤣 I wonder what happened to him.

40 Turn 'round quick and start to run Part 2

God help me. How do I start this? What was going on then? Was it the Age of Aquarius or were we all Manson cult followers. I can't be sure of what was going on everywhere, but all the people I knew were tripped out in one way or another. Maybe it was the cyclamates we all drank in the fizzies as kids.

 

I'm not sure of the first time I heard Black Sabbath. Damn, I played that album repeatedly and loud. I listened to other heavy bands but then the thought of these dark forces that we could harness... I just wanted to know if it was possible. Could we break free from all the repressive forces? Everyday of my school life I heard about sin. All those forbidden acts and the wrath of god. I hated going to confession. Every Friday they'd line us up and in we'd go. Let's see... what could I say that sounds good... a little bit of sin, but too much. Somehow our inner most thoughts were grounds for punishment too. You mean there's a way to reach out and find what these other dimensions might hold without becoming cowering and obedient, groveling for a bit redemption. I wanted to see what was out there.

A few ex Catholic school kids and I got into the Satanic Bible. (Later it was Raymond Buckland) I haven't looked at that book in decades, but I'm pretty sure we got instruction for some rituals there. I was already practicing meditation and brought myself to out of body experiences a few times. I had no problem channeling my spirit. I don't think there were really many results to any of the rituals we performed except for sex. We were novices and yeah, we did them in my room. Not the sex. Just the rituals. I had an upstairs room and my parents were usually downstairs having a few suburban cocktails. "What's going on up there?" "Nothing. Just listening to music."

I mentioned a while back not many of us had cars. Just a few. So there were a lot of unusual sex settings. It seems as though our rituals worked. We did them to entice our desired. But really, everyone was out of their minds with sex then, I don't think we needed the added forces. They were fun anyway. So I brought my desired to one of the chapels at my parish. Churches were always open then. I don't know, I'm afraid to think and sorry if we had anything to do with them being locked up nowadays. But anyway. We consecrated it. The walls of this chapel were all jutting natural rocks, like a grotto.

We took mescaline that night. I will never forget each rock morphed into a fox. The walls of the church were undulating with the movement of the foxes. We sat in a pew towards the back of the church and did it. Sitting position. No thought of "what if someone comes in?" Those really were the days, before cameras everywhere. What a night. 🌟

Out of the small group, I definitely was into the church sex sacrament more than anyone else.😼 I could feel the sacredness that permeated. Air and fire through repeated burning of incense. Water through the water blessed with intention. Earth through the natural materials of wood and rock in the buildings.

The next time we went to the fancy cathedral in the next town. We found the choir box up above most comfortable. Nice view and the thought of the choir singing there on Sunday gave us a giggle.

View from the box

Someone lifted a platen and I feel bad about that. It's just a thing, but who knows what kind of emotion it held. Could be a cursed object now.

Several more times we made visits to various chapels. Usually high on hash or mescaline. What was with us? I don't know.

The last time we made use of the church they had locked the doors. I think there were more people using it than us. I know there were. Someone probably got caught. Well, I don't know... it just couldn't wait I guess. Where are we going to go? Right here. In the doorway? Ok. So it proceeded. A few minutes in we hear yelling in horrible New York accents, "Hey, we see you in there." "We called the police." Shit. They called the police. Well, we skedaddled. We really should have stayed and let them arrest us. That would have been a scandal for all time. Plenty more anyway.

So. I guess some people must have blabbed or something. I don't know. I was walking by the church on my way back from a friends and the "head priest" came briskly walking towards me. I just have a couple of words for that guy and one of them is prick. Many young people had words like that for him. He wasn't a kindly benefactor hoping to bring a prodigal son into his pack. He was cruel to many of the boys. Well, he stopped me and told me I could never go back into the church to receive the sacraments. I didn't say anything but it sure didn't break me. I didn't go home and cry. I went on with it. 

I also want to say we never hurt a human besides ourselves and I always have a place in my heart for young people that may go a little crazy. I know how the mind can go there.