This essay was written when I was attending Western Hills High School in Cincinnati, Ohio, in approximately 1969. This was inspired by Tom Wolfe's The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test.
This essay is untitled. It has been edited in 2007 for clarity.
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THIS IS INTENDED TO HAVE JEFFERSON AIRPLANE"S "AFTER BATHING AT BAXTER'S" PLAYING BEHIND IT...
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And we're into it. God created the Heavens & the Earth... an' cops an' hippies and plastics an' groupies and even a few George Wallace supporters...............
Then, of course, there was the beginning of the Great Revolution in S.F. back in '65–'67... Ken Kesey & the Merry Pranksters; the Grateful Dead, et. al. "Hash-bury" was the new "in" thing then... acid, too... all the old Beatniks from North Beach were either turning on, tuning in, etc, or else just giving up and wallowing in their incomprehension of the whole insane bit.........
The ballrooms were hot... The Avalon and the Fillmore... Quicksilver Messenger Service shrieking "Mona;" Jefferson Airplane wailing "Somebody to Love"..... Janice Joplin getting it together with "Ball & Chain".....
.....the zapping '60's! With acid everything (rock, heads) — you know, the incredible irreverent bit; a brand new word on everybody'd lips: psychedelic, man! ..........
Meanwhile, on the other end of the Movement spectrum, civil rights marches and sit-ins...
Something politically new being produced too: to the establishment's horror, Draft Resisters! Speeches an' rallies an' desert boots........
Increasing intolerance of the Establishment— Johnson, McNamara & Co.,,,,,,,,,, Ho! Ho! Ho Chi Minh! ... echoing and echoing ..................
Back in Frisco the whole thing had reached an incredibly intense orgasm of energy and Lovely excitement.................
"Lids, speed, acid" chanted at passerby from dark alleys and doorways............ incredible!
the establishment picks up on the Hip productions reprocesses and plasticizes it, the regurgitates it for its own consumption......
......the "involved" kids were discovering that the tales of police brutality told by blacks were not just made up and an Aware person became a "political n---"........ Then, in the heat of the march on thee Pentagon, that impenetrable white monolith of Amerikan imperialist militarocracy, something far-out happened ...........
..........the Hippies and the involved radicals fused and were self-put-on-ly dubbed "Yippies"... then the Chicago Democratic farce-convention of 1968.........
Months before, radicals had almost toppled France and had taken over Columbia University.......
Now everyone was wondering whether there really was a planet-wide Youth Revolution happening...... in every publication, such people as William F. Buckley & Jerry Rubin pontificated about it... plus some other, obscure names just to make it interesting.....
.........The hue & cry of the young generation changed from "Blow Your Mind!" to "Up Against the Wall, Motherf--!!" and was adopted by the new breed of anti-estabishmentarians as a battle cry. . .
while tithe establishment was still using the old, now inaccurate chestnut of "it's a commie plot (you know, the only good commie is one who's dead?...)
Well, that's how it goes, but — Is It?
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