by G E Barr

Created on: April 21, 2009   Last Updated: August 20, 2011

Remembering The Sixties

I recall the nineteen-sixties very well. As a curious, adventurous child, not old enough to join the revolution. Three aspects of the sixties overwhelm my memory.

Richard Nixon. Vietnam. Music.

I recall being constantly bombarded by images of violence and strange music which did not settle well with my soul. In nature, I found respite and plenty of curious things. I spent a lot of time at both of my grandparents places and they lived in the country, so I was free to roam, both on foot and horseback through sanctuaries of nature's peace. I have sat upon a horse and watched a raccoon wash itself in creek water, and I have watched coyotes trotting across meadows at dusk. When my mother remarried, a man in the air force, we went to live in Okinawa. The beaches on Okinawa at that time were shell rich. The vegetation on the island fascinated me. It was there, in that magical place that I often munched on sugar cane.

The sixties were a strange time. Not everyone from that era was a hippie. For some, the sixties were like waking up inside a Picasso painting. As though everything familiar became unfamiliar and electrified with questions which were, for some unanswerable. And rather than self analyze or introspect, they were fearful and looked upon the abstractions merely as comparative. As in, they're weird, we're not.

I saw some morbid things in this phase of my childhood. I also experienced physical, emotional and mental abuse. I did not experience a lot of sexual abuse as a child and I'm thankful that I didn't. The other abuse was enough to affect me in life long ways.

My brother, sister and I were not particularly violent with one another, so when we gained a violent step brother who, for a time enjoyed attacking my brother, it was so depressing. I finally, sick and tired of seeing my brother hit on, became my brother's body guard. Needless to say, I became adept at fighting. I remember that it was a well thought-out decision to defend my brother and when I finally did, I amazed even myself.

My mother had told me not to get involved, so that my brother would learn to defend himself. I did not appreciate her logic and so I took matters into my own hands. To some, this would mean that I was a violent child. I guess if I'd not defended my brother and the abuse continued, then that would have been okay somehow.

In the 1960's I learned, away from Oklahoma, to defend those being beaten on and beaten down, honing my skills by getting beaten up by

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