"If you can remember the 60's...."

Greetings from the North West Coast of the US of A! There's something about the Oregon Coast that just stays in your system...so when I left my high school buddys' Linda and Roy Arnett's house I rented a car and drove down the coast. It was a totally stunning day and I was totally blissed out that I declined a bus or a train. Highway 5-which is faster-is so boring and flat. This way I got to see beaches, mountains, redwoods all in one drive. Up top are some shots of the Oregon coastline...and below you are looking at Redwood Highway, North of Arcata and Eureka- just about one of the only stands of redwoods left in the state. The photo does not do it justice, because in reality you cannot see the tops of the trees they are so tall and so old. These ones are relatively new [maybe only 500 years old] because you can actually see the circumfrence of the tree. Between Eureka and Berkeley are another stand of redwoods which has the famous one that you can drive through.



As I indicated, I was headed towards Berkeley-from whence the saying: "If you can remember the 60's you weren't really there" came. I remembered some of it, but when did they change the name of one of the major streets to Martin Luther King Jr Way and what was the name of it before it was changed? I stayed on University Avenue, which was only a stone's throw away from the entrance to the Uni, so I had plenty of opportunity to walk around and reminisce. Perfect! You abosolutely cannot visit Berkeley without either a walk through the University grounds or a walk down Telegraph Avenue [location of every demonstration I ever went on except the first one, which was in front of the Admin building]. It's called Sproul Hall and it looks lonely and empty now, but imagine about 5,000 students standing in front of it listening to speeches about Free Speech. In the foreground would have been a police car which held one of the leaders of the student movement inside and about 40 people sitting on top of the car. It was an historic moment for the student movement in the 60's and thus began my political career. [much to the despair of my family]

The campus was every bit as beautiful as I remembered it [yes, I remember something]...and I had to buy a tie-die teeshirt before I left and headed south to LA. [more about LA in another entry]. I spent a couple of days there and noticed how trendy it had become. Had some conversations with older street sellers which was good and walked over to the last house I lived in before I left the place- only to come back as a tourist [like now].

The drive to LA was hot and dusty [I caved in and went down Highway 5] and about 100 miles outside of LA, the traffic slowed to a crawl and I crept into LA at about 5 miles and hour. I had heard the traffic was bad, but this was ridiculous!.

I am staying with another old friend from Hollywood High School and her dogs up in Brentwood. She lives down the street from John Travolta, and I am pretty sure that when I walked past his house this morning at 6:30 AM he would have come out to say G'day if he had only known it was me. I had lunch with an old teacher today, which was a gas. It is he who inspired me to be a teacher and he was a tough old bird [still is] but I learned more from him than any other of my teachers at HHS.

Tune into the entry called HHS friends to see some pics of my old mates....

More later- must immerse myself in some West LA cult-cher.

Genie