Well, I came upon a child of God
He was walking along the road
And I asked him, Tell where are you going?
This he told me
Said, I’m going down to Yasgur’s Farm,
Gonna join in a rock and roll band.
Got to get back to the land and set my soul free….
I wasn’t alive, of course, when the Woodstock Music and Arts Fair happened — I’m slightly younger than the Mother of Bloggers I work with here, LOL. But I do understand what a watershed moment Woodstock was. Harper was telling me about a friend from her childhood who had been invited to go with some friends…and he turned them down. He kicked himself later, and made a trip to Max Yasgur’s Farm with a friend this year to see the site.
It’s unimaginable in some ways what went on there, when compared with what society is today. Three days that rolled over into a fourth accidentally, with thousands of people living in pretty rugged conditions — and there were no violent incidents. It was all about the music and the movement. At least one baby was born on site, and I wouldn’t be surprised if a whole bunch of them were conceived there at one point or another. It’s something that can only be imitated anymore, never duplicated, though I understand people have tried; it captured a moment of innocence that we’re probably too crabbed and jaded to seize again.
But one can hope….
***
By the time we got to Woodstock,
We were half a million strong
And everywhere was a song and a celebration.
And I dreamed I saw the bomber death planes
Riding shotgun in the sky,
Turning into butterflies
Above our nation….
