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Woodstock Then, Woodstock Now

Yesterday at the anniversary concert: [More...]

Mike Littwin of the Denver Post has an amusing column today, We Are Stardust, on why he wasn't there. The New York Daily News has an editorial, We Were Stardust:

See, once upon a time, before the music industry blow-dried and promoted and shrink-wrapped every imaginable act and event, things just ... happened. They expected 50,000. About 10 times that number descended. Some of them were maligned as damn dirty hippies and some were. There was no water, showers or bathrooms. Over the course of the festival, the dirty got dirtier.

In the age of Facebook and Twitter, you can manufacture crowds and gin up enthusiasm. But you can't manufacture the moment when Jupiter aligns with Mars and love - or something like it - steers the stars.

Is all this attention on Woodstock making anyone besides me feel really old? Just look at all the lawn chairs in the pictures from yesterday's concert. Happily the music lives on, the rest I'm ready to move past.

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  • Display: Sort:
    Was Richie Havens there? (5.00 / 1) (#1)
    by Dadler on Sun Aug 16, 2009 at 01:34:03 PM EST
    Watched the "new" Woodstock film and remembered how much I love Havens.  "Freedom...freedom... freedom...freedom...sometimes I feel...like a motherless child..."

    Yes (5.00 / 1) (#2)
    by squeaky on Sun Aug 16, 2009 at 01:46:21 PM EST
    Yes (none / 0) (#3)
    by squeaky on Sun Aug 16, 2009 at 03:52:09 PM EST
    BETHEL, N.Y. -- Nearly 40 years to the day that he christened the crowning achievement of the 1960s counterculture, Richie Havens returned to an open field in Sullivan County to sing about a primal human condition, the pursuit of which binds us all.

    link

    Parent

    If this makes you feel old, then you don't want (5.00 / 2) (#5)
    by Molly Bloom on Sun Aug 16, 2009 at 06:33:34 PM EST
    to read this

    It may be a sign of the times - but apparently not everyone knows who ....  is. At least not when he's caught peering into a house window and soaking wet with a hood on....

    A resident of the town saw a man .... peering in the window of a home, unaware that it was because the home was for sale.
    The two officers asked .... for his name but did not believe it was him until he escorted them to his hotel where he provided identification



    Definitely (none / 0) (#7)
    by Jeralyn on Sun Aug 16, 2009 at 08:21:59 PM EST
    We had a spirited discussion about it here.

    Parent
    It was the best of times (5.00 / 1) (#6)
    by Saul on Sun Aug 16, 2009 at 07:06:05 PM EST
    It was the worst of times.

    The 1960 was the beginning of the revolution directed mainly at our government.  No longer was their any respect for our government.  

    I lived through it.  In fact my next stop was suppose to be Vietnam.   I was drafted right before I could finish my last two years of college.  The college I was waiting to finish my last two years had an ROTC program.  I had asked them if I joined the ROTC program would they postpone my draft eduction. Letters were written and I was allowed to finish with the understanding that right after graduation I would have to report for duty.  All the training at this college's ROTC program was strictly in artillery and being in the artillery branch .  The only job I would get after getting my commission would be that of a forward observer.(FO)  The army was not computerized at that time so all targets had to be called in by the forward observe to the guns.  So you were very close to the targets.  Once a fire mission was called in by the FO the Vietcong knew that the only way that artillery was incoming was because some FO was close by.  So they immediately looked for him to silence him. The life expectancy of an FO at that time was approximately 6 months  

    Well a funny thing happen upon graduation from college and the ROTC program.  I was told by my ROTC commander that I was an excellent student and I was to be classified as a DMS student.(distinguish military student) Here I was a guy that did not want anything to do with this man's army and who was very much against the war yet I was being recognized by these credentials.   He said the benefits of this  recognition was that I did not have to stay in the artillery branch, I could also choose where I wanted to be initially  station (I chose Germany) and moreover, that I would receive a regular army commission in lieu of a reserve  commission.  The regular army commission is the same commission given to the West Point graduates.  I chose to be in the combat engineers.  A little better than artillery but not that much better.  My tour obligation was for 3 years.  A West Pointer had to give 5 years.  (of course his whole education was paid by the government and that is why) I finish my three years in Germany and decided to resign  my commission.  The army does not have to accept your resignation if it is a regular army commission especially  if they need you.  I sweated their decision but the RIF (reduction in forces was just being initiated) so they let me go.  

    I enjoyed the experience while I was in the army even became a company commander.  Getting command time is a very coveted thing while in the service.  I learned a lot, and respected all those that had to go to Vietman.  The majority of soliders that went to  Vietnam did not want to be there or in the service.  All of them with few exceptions were drafted. I was surprise though at how many West Pointers (West Pointers want to be in the army) who  were my friends, that knew withing the 1 st year that the army was not for them but they had to wait 5 years before they could resign.      

    I guess it was just not my time.  I thank God for this.

    Woodstock now (2.00 / 1) (#4)
    by lentinel on Sun Aug 16, 2009 at 06:21:06 PM EST
    is Obama.
    We all gather.
    Sing songs.
    Create slogans.
    Feel like a counterculture.
    And it leads nowhere.