Where Have All The Passions Gone

Confluences. Synchronicities. Maybe age is responsible for the piling on of connecting moments. On Wednesday afternoon, I walked through Macy's and found myself amazed once again at the peace symbols, flowy gauze, and the sign that proclaimed this fashion season "The Summer of Love." Wednesday night, I watched American Masters' special on Pete Seeger. How similar; how different; how inspiring; how sad.

Although I was only in high school during the original Summer of Love, the migration to the Haight in '67, I was already looking and acting much the classic hippie. Beads and ponchos, water buffalo sandals and, yes, even flowers in my long straight hair. I listened to The Beatles and The Stones but I also continued listening to the music my brother had introduced me to early in the sixties: The Kingston Trio, Joan Baez, Buffy Saint-Marie, Bob Dylan and most importantly of all, Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger. I knew the Pete Seeger version of "Little Boxes" but I also heard the original sung by Malvina Reynolds. I read Broadside magazine, went to the coffeehouses at Ohio State and at fifteen dated, much to my parents' dismay, a twenty-year old banjo player in my brother's jug band.

Easy, you might think, for a very middle-class white girl living in an upper middle-class neighborhood to dress the part, much like the girls shopping at Macy's now. But I had something most of them don't: I believed the message. I was Jewish in a WASP enclave; I was incensed by the discrimination my black friends from the Junior Theater group encountered; and I was an "active pacifist." When my school district needed to try to pass a tax levy, I stumped door to door for it and when it was voted down, I wore all black to school, breaking the dress code by wearing pants and a black armband of protest. I don't know how my parents felt about my frequent appearances on the local news being the teen interviewed about local politics such as this and about the anti-war rallies we held, but they never voiced discouragement. Some of my other activities as a "hippie" I'm sure would have not been as easy for them to swallow if they had known (nudge, nudge; wink, wink). But editing and writing for the underground newspaper--not a problem.

And the beat went on. The horror of Kent State--so close to where I lived. Tear gas during the rallies on The Oval at OSU. Anger that I wasn't allowed to go with my brother to Woodstock. And the belief that I was going to make a difference in the world--because people like Pete Seeger said I could.

And yet another confluence, another synchronicity. I read very recently an obituary in The New York Times of a professor: a professor of folklore. And I saw the name, Archie Green, and realized "Oh my God, he was my folklore professor." I took a class from him when he was a visiting prof at Ohio State--such a mild, unassuming man in a plaid work shirt and jeans whose love of his work drew me in. I never imagined that he was considered "the" leading professor of folklore in the country until I read that obituary. And I remember a paper I wrote for him on the portrayal on the American Indian in movies. But now, I remembered something more, remembered him telling me that he thought I should go to law school and become an advocate for the Native American. So I was going to make a difference in the world--because Archie Green said I could.

Although I didn't go to law school, I did go on to become a teacher of college writing even though I could have made more money as a lit teacher. No, I wanted to teach writing, especially remedial writing, because I wanted to make a difference. I read Myna Shaughnessy's book Errors and Expectations which talked about how students who seem only semi-literate will watch errors melt away when they are taught to write ideas and not just words. What a spark was lit! I could make students better writers not by counting their spelling errors but by challenging them to think. I could make a difference in their world--because Myna Shaughnessy said I could.

I never cared about making money. And not making money is the one real success I've had. I own a faltering, always on the verge of closing, business that I put far more money into than I'll ever take out. But where has "making a difference" gone? Oh, I vote, yes, and after Bush invaded Iraq, I even walked into the coffeeshop the next morning and put on a Phil Ochs CD, knowing it would offend some clientele. But listening to Pete Seeger singing "We Shall Overcome" and "Waist Deep in the Big Muddy" and thinking about this 90 year old man standing in the cold to sing at Obama's inauguration, I'm moved and inspired and ashamed and angry.

I always believed I would make a difference--all these great people told me I could--and yet. . .