...we tried to start a new way of living and then forgot its tenants. We had amazing leaders who we did not listen to ~ even after they gave their lives because of their message. Instead we beatified them and put them up as examples to forget. Robert Kennedy comes to mind here who left his rich background and went to the lettuce fields that literally left him on his knees in tears because of its poverty. At that time Caesar Chavez was beginning to speak to the injustice of the labor conditions there and Robert heard him. It was one of the reasons that inspired his run for president. After MLK and Kennedy were killed it was as if a vacuum formed and it became the time to forget the ideals we began in the '60s
Instead we ignored Kennedy, MLK, Malcolm X and so many others who saw the injustices and instead floundered with the formation of "yuppies" who only wanted to drink old wine and go to Europe, make a lot of money, delay their parenting years until their 40s and then sign up for expensive "kindergarten college" before their children were born.
During that time as a young single mom, I went the opposite way of my generation and did not want consumption to be my main focus. I was with the ones who were still speaking about injustice in the 1990s but was snickered at because I was "too idealistic". My path was different than my generation because I had spent time with African American elders from the Old South, the "boat people" from Vietnam, the Hispanic communities forming in my city, the Chinese and Japanese Americans who had come to this country before my people. I learned a great deal about the past that is affecting us today because their suffering and struggles told me that my own family background was not too different ~ although I had some very racist relatives who refused to mingle or listen to them.
Raised as a Christian I communed with people of other faiths and found a God that strengthened my own faith inspiring a book of poetry (not published) that I called, "Looking for a Familiar God". Even though I was poor and not college educated I read voraciously so that I could talk with a nuclear physicist, a young person raised in the ghetto, a teacher, a pioneer in the computer "geek" field, a botanist, an astronomer, rock and classical musicians, actors, to discuss theology with leaders of faith in the Muslim, Jewish, Hindu and my own Christian communities. I knew the blues player Robert Cray when he was a street musician sitting on the curb with his guitar case opened for change, I met a jazz singer, Esther Phillips whose amazing performances included a sung back-and-forth conversation with her audience. I sat with her between her sets and she was full of love and wisdom tainted by a hard life that brought her fleeting fame. She predicted I was pregnant with my son when I had been married for 8 years and did not think it was possible. Those few hours with her were life changing because her fading youth, her eyes holding all she had seen, her insight as to who I was after only a few minutes of knowing me, her camaraderie with me woman-to-woman and her trust of me as a white woman even though I was probably a symbol of all she suffered. She died in NYC a year later of a heroin overdose.
The most ironic thing I see with my generation is that all those yuppies who bought their fancy homes and cars, whose homes had expensive Persian rugs woven by the tiny fingers of a 4 year old chained to their looms and with plastic containers of things that now create entire islands in our oceans, whose jobs were "important" laughed at the likes of those like me and considered us "wasting our time". They are now in the same economic condition I have been in all along. They rejected the union movements our grandparents died to create and are now all surprised that all they accumulated is gone because they did not listen to their grandparents and parents whose lives were comfortable because of the work for better conditions of employment and access to education that came before us. Not only are they old, they sucked the resources right out of the ground and there isn't anything left for them ~ or their children. It is not as if they did not have powerful and quite wise leaders, but instead of heeding what these leaders had to say, they built statues and made holidays to "celebrate" them and then turned their backs on what they had been told.
No longer am I bitter, I am proud about what I saw and lived, because I tried to listen to my elders. Sadly, now all that was warned is coming to fruition. I see a new generation who are listening to my leader's call for justice. They are our hope, they are the ones who will begin to rebuild what my generation tore down. I remember my grandfather telling me this would come. He told me that we would have to begin from the bottom up if my generation did not make sure what he and his generation had built would remain and if we built upon it instead of destroy it. I almost did not believe it until I watched ~ and lived ~ with the destruction of my generation has done to all my grandparent's generation had tried to create.
Recently I met a group of young rap singers from NYC. They are Latino and their message is poetic, compelling and powerful. Their group is called "Rebel Diaz" http://www.rebeldiaz.com. I am from a generation whose parents were shocked at Elvis Presley's "swivel hips" which I did not understand was so shocking as I had *no* idea about the hint of sexuality he was sharing. So many of my parent's generation who had fought WWII, also fought us because we wore long hair and dressed "like hippies". At 60, I sat and listened to this young group of people who were so intelligent, so talented, and so energetic who are speaking truth to power. I was not shocked as my generation often is at the reality these young people try to convey, nope, I was impressed and encouraged. Now I listen to their music in my car and smile to myself because well ...grandmas aren't supposed to like such things.
We live in Seattle and my Latino sons, who are themselves trying to rap, told me about these NYC youth, "They are East Coast Rappers, can't you hear it in their work?" No I cannot hear that because I am not so hip as they are to this music. But I did not care whether or not they are "East Coast" , actually I just like what they had to say ~ and I like many of my kids' "West Coast" rapping as well. I told them that whether or not is is "East Coast" or "West Coast" the important thing is the message, the awesome poetry, the passion that they give to us. I guess it supposedly matters to them which coast it comes from as to what is "better", but these young people in Rebel Diaz came from where rap began and sat at the knee of the pioneers of rap. My kids have to agree that this is important all right ~ so for once maybe I "knew" as much as they did about the history of rap, lol.
My view of the '60s is wistful and kind of sad because my generation did not listen to the powerful movement that fizzled mainly because of greed, IMO. To me this greed has fomented what we see today. I am very sad that my kids and their kids will have to struggle to re-make what we destroyed. Because our resources are being hoarded by a few and they now have the power, I wonder if these kids will ever achieve what my parents enjoyed and if they will die trying. All I can do is try to teach them about the past, knowing full well they will not listen until they get wiser, because this is what my generation also did. If my old yuppie friends are not dead because of their over-consumption, they now say, "What happened? We worked so hard! We had so much! What was my life all about? Now we do not have anything after all we did to accumulate this stuff ..." While they have been so dummass about the emptiness of their lives, I still hope they are getting the picture. Although it is too late for us to change what we have made, it is not too late for us to tell our youth so they can learn from our mistakes and teach them to channel their rage into creativity whether they be a musician, a garbage collector, making sandwiches for the downtown lunch crowd, as a physician, or an engineer.
My 2 cents,
Cat in Seattle
= new reply since forum marked as read
