Repost of a remembrance - 11 years later

Remembering Woodstock 1969

Note This was previously posted 8/14/2009

Man, who could forget that moment in history, forty years ago, when we gathered, half a million strong, for those few days of Peace, Love and Music? 

OK, so maybe I was not there, but I heard about it on the radio. Hey, my wife and I had jobs in those days; responsibilities - rent, careers, and a baby on-the-way.

It was actually a memorable summer for us - but, not because of any music concert. In July we had taken a cruise to Bermuda as a sort of delayed honeymoon. We were young, clean cut, and had never heard of Jimmi Hendrix or Janis Joplin. We were still under the musical influence of Bobby Darren and The Kingston Trio. 

The gathering at Woodstock would never have appeared on our radar. We were trying to break-in, not drop-out. We did not even know anyone that did drugs or practiced free love.

One of my musical memories of that summer was driving through the Sumner Tunnel in Boston and hearing an unfamiliar but haunting song that was playing loudly on someone's 8-track tape. (In those days there was no radio reception in the tunnels). The vocal harmony was magnetic and thrilling to me, but I did not recognize the artists. 

It was only when the Woodstock movie came out, I was able to identify the group and the song - "Judy Blue Eyes" by Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young. Ok, I know what you are thinking, I was out of touch. So sue me.

When the story came out about Woodstock - 3 days of sharing close proximity with masses of drugged out hippies who had not bathed recently, dancing in the mud and blocking other people's view of the stage, standing in line for the few porta-potties with 399,000 other bursting bladders, I was secretly glad that I was not there. 

I say 'secretly', because as I later discovered everyone thought you were cool if you could claim to have been there. Only a clueless dolt would admit that a) he didn't go and b) did not regret missing it.

Most of the performers at Woodstock are probably dead by now, if not forgotten. And, most of the attendees who survived the drugs and free love would be at the age where they are in or close to retirement. For me, it is hard to believe that forty years have passed like an express train in the night.