The First of 8 secrets of building Resistance. The Summer of Love 1967

 The first of the 8 secrets to building unshakable resilience. The Summer of Love 1967 and my decent into darkness.

The air thrummed with a rebellious energy, a potent mix of peace, protest, and burgeoning self-discovery. San Francisco, in particular, was a kaleidoscope of vibrant colors and revolutionary ideas, where the scent of incense mingled with the distant strains of sitars and electric guitars. And I, a naive 16-year-old, freshly graduated from high school, was right there, caught in its burgeoning tide.

When I started at Sacramento City College in the fall of 1966, I was still clinging to the edges of childhood, not turning 17 until later that year. The world, however, was already hurtling forward, shedding its old skin for something wilder, freer. The counterculture was a restless beast, just awakening, its roar still a murmur, its iconic aesthetic just taking shape. We didn't call ourselves "hippies" then. That label, as I'd later learn, was something coined by others, often with a hint of derision.

The Genesis of "Hippie"

The term "hippie," as Melissa Petruzzello details in Britannica, evolved from the word "hip," a descriptor for being up-to-date and fashionable, a term rooted in the African American Jive Era of the 1930s and '40s. By the 1950s, "hip" was synonymous with the Beats—Allen Ginsberg, Jack Kerouac—the bohemian artists who laid the groundwork for the counterculture movement. As 1965 rolled into 1966, a new generation of youths, drawn to the Beat ideals, began converging in San Francisco's Haight-Ashbury district. It was local journalists who first applied "hippie" to this nascent subculture, and by 1967, thanks to Herb Caen, a columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle, the word exploded into national, then international, consciousness. It wasn't a term we used to describe ourselves, but it stuck.

Fashioning a Revolution

Our "costumes" were an evolving tapestry of self-expression. Gone were the stiff, conservative styles of our parents' generation. We embraced eccentric clothing with an ethnic flair: embroidered blouses that spoke of distant lands, mini-skirts that defied societal norms, worn without the constricting bras that symbolized an earlier era of female oppression. Our wardrobes became a global bazaar of textiles from India, Pakistan, and various Asian and tribal cultures.

Low-slung, hip-hugging bell-bottom jeans were ubiquitous, adorned with countless beads and tribal-influenced jewelry. Flowers, both real and embroidered, cascaded through our hair, and the omnipresent peace symbol was emblazoned on everything from jackets to protest signs. Think of Sonny and Cher's early looks, or the flamboyant outfits of rock stars like Jimi Hendrix and Janis Joplin – they were our sartorial prophets. Young men, once constrained by short, neat haircuts, let their hair grow long and wild, mirroring the burgeoning freedom in the air. The times, as Bob Dylan crooned, truly were a-changin'. We were the young, counterculture visionaries, fueled by a collective dream of world peace and universal love.

A Fateful Encounter

It was in my psychology class in early 1967 that I met Gary. He was everything I wasn't: clean-cut, preppy, with a wholesome all-American aura. In high school, he'd been their mascot, "Wampum Willie," hooting and hollering with the cheerleaders, a popular, handsome figure. He radiated a quiet charm, a thoughtful curiosity that drew me in. We gravitated towards each other, our debates about psychology lectures morphing into genuine conversations. He was a gentleman, always offering to carry my books, a stark contrast to the rough-and-tumble boys I'd known. Our friendship blossomed, evolving into a tentative romance as we began attending rallies and protests together.

The counterculture was gathering irreversible momentum, and we, like so many others, found ourselves swept into its current. Gary shed his preppy façade with an almost tangible relief. His tailored shirts gave way to tie-dyed t-shirts, his neatly trimmed hair grew long and wild, often held back by a colorful headband. Bell-bottoms replaced his chinos, and soon, we were both indistinguishable from the growing legions of "hippies." Our parents, understandably, were less than thrilled with our new personas, their worried glances following us as we embarked on trips to rallies, concerts, and the legendary Haight-Ashbury – the undisputed mecca of the hippie movement in San Francisco.

The Paradox of the Era: Purity and Peril and my journey into darkness 

(Read more here)

Our embrace of the counterculture extended beyond just clothing and music. We started taking self-care seriously, albeit in a uniquely 60s way. The newly opened Whole Foods Market became our temple of nourishment. We became devout vegetarians, our days punctuated by the whirring of our juicer. We drank so much carrot juice that our skin literally took on an orange hue from all the beta-carotene, a bizarre badge of honor. We devoured greens, experimented with couscous, hummus, bulgur, mung beans, and a bewildering array of soy products, convinced we were purifying our bodies and spirits.

Our environment, too, became an extension of our burgeoning idealism. We adorned our walls and ceilings with vibrant cotton tapestries from India, their intricate patterns a visual balm. Posters of our favorite rock bands—Jefferson Airplane, Grateful Dead, The Doors—adorned every available space. Complex mandalas, reminiscent of ancient Tibetan art, glowed under the eerie purple hues of black lights, their neon colors pulsating with a hypnotic energy. Flyers from marches, sit-ins, and demonstrations, alongside psychedelic concert posters advertising light shows, created a visual cacophony that both soothed and stimulated. The air was thick with the scent of patchouli and the constant, thrumming bass of rock music, blasting from vinyl records or 8-track tapes. Headbands and dried flower power mementos hung from every hook, each a silent testament to our shared ideals. When your environment is in harmony, so are you, we believed, and this chaotic, vibrant tapestry was our vision of harmony.

Yet, this era was defined by a profound and dangerous dichotomy: the simultaneous pursuit of radical health and the reckless exploration of mind-altering drugs. We were meticulous about our organic food, yet cavalier about what we ingested in other forms. Gary, in particular, became increasingly immersed in the drug scene. There's an old saying: "First, the man takes the drugs. Then, the drugs take the drugs. Finally, the drugs take the man." This adage became chillingly true for Gary.

He became a connoisseur of different marijuana strains, his expertise extending to creating special blends of pot from various regions in Mexico. His newfound skill made him popular, and soon, he was a sought-after dealer of exotic cannabis. It wasn't long before he delved into hallucinogens: peyote, psilocybin mushrooms, and then, the ultimate mind-bender, LSD. From there, it was a swift descent into the world of amphetamines ("uppers") and barbiturates ("downers").

The Descent into Darkness

His personality began to fracture, rapidly and terrifyingly. The once gentle, preppy young man was replaced by someone I barely recognized. He became intensely paranoid, his eyes constantly darting, his gaze distant. He began collecting and building weapons, mostly swords and knives of all types. His fascination with machetes grew unsettling, and soon, one was a permanent fixture under the front seat of his "hippie van" – a massive, decommissioned red ambulance.

I was done. The changes in him, the growing darkness that eclipsed his light, terrified me. I broke up with him, trying to distance myself as much as possible. What I didn't know then, what he never spoke of, was the deep wound of his parents' divorce when he was young. He carried an unhealed burden of separation anxiety and feelings of abandonment, a silent sorrow that festered beneath his drug-fueled facade. When I left him, it triggered a complete mental breakdown, undoubtedly exacerbated by his escalating use of methamphetamines and barbiturates. In the vernacular of the day, he'd taken too many uppers and then too many downers—a speedball. He was "freaking out," having a truly "bad trip."

His mother, desperate and terrified, called "the fuzz." They found him incoherent, slumped in his room amidst a pile of tiny, shredded pieces of my graduation photo, scribbling "Love. Hate. Why?" over and over. His sister, a loyal but misguided accomplice, managed to stash his drugs, weapons, and money before the police arrived, saving him from jail and sending him instead to the county psych ward.

After that incident, his obsession with me spiraled. He began stalking me at school, calling relentlessly, showing up at my friends' houses, even following me out of town to surprise me while I was staying with friends. He tried desperately to lure me back, to talk to me, to undo the "damage" I had caused. I avoided him, my fear growing with each encounter. Once, in his sister's car, he spotted us, jumped in, and held a knife to my throat, his eyes wild with a mixture of pain and rage. His abandonment wound, magnified by the drugs, had driven him to madness. He genuinely believed that only with me in his life could he regain his sanity.

The Unspeakable Act

This terrifying cat-and-mouse game continued into the spring of 1968. One day, he came to my parents' home in the middle of the day, knowing they would both be at work. He was high on LSD, crying, pleading. "I just need you to talk with me," he sobbed, swearing he wouldn't hurt me. But then he pushed his way through the door. The knife appeared again, its cold steel against my skin. He raped me, crying the entire time, repeating over and over, "Now we are together again."

I never told anyone. Not then. The shame, the terror, the unbearable weight of it all, silenced me. And then, the ultimate, devastating consequence: I found myself pregnant from that single, horrific act. Abortion was illegal, a dark, dangerous secret. My only choices were a perilous trip to Mexico, risking my life in a back-alley procedure, or a prohibitively expensive journey to Japan, where it was legal. Neither was a viable option. And now, I was left with the impossible task of telling my parents. My enraged father, consumed by anger and shame, kicked me out of the house.

Alone, pregnant, and cast out, I faced a future I couldn't comprehend. How would I survive? How would I protect this burgeoning life within me from the shadow of its violent conception? And could I ever find a way to heal from the wounds that had shattered my youthful dreams?

To be continued next week...