About a week or so ago, I e-mailed pictures of my daughter, Sarah, to friends; she'd just turned twenty.
One reply, in addition to congradulating her, said, "ahh, to be twenty again...."which of course started me thinking.
Twenty, for me, was the Bicentennial, and the U.S. Navy; I spent the first six months of the year in the service, and got out on Micheal McDowell's (later, my niece Alana's) birthday, sixteen July.
I didn't see it a a defeat, just a return to Life My Own Way.
Lakeview Park was still jumping-it'd be three more years before the cops blitzkreiged the place. It seemed like the whole world was smoking pot, and I certainly smoked my share. All my friends were high, and it seemed like the straights weren't really concerned about it anymore.
Musically, we suffered through "Shannon", "Afternoon Delight", "Fifty Ways To Leave Your Lover", and "Convoy", not to mention disco. CKLW was still puttin' it out, but the handwriting was already on the wall. The local FM market was booming, with WMMS, WGCL, and WNCR in the forefront.
The Tivoli was still in operation, but would be gone in a year....the Palace closed its doors in '76, to be reborn as the Lorain Palace Civic Center-the las movie I saw at the Palace Theatre was "Carrie".
TV-what was good about it had already been on for a while.
That was being twenty then, for me....I dunno if I'd want to be twenty now. The world's not as forgiving of youthful ignorance as it was then.
I was 20 in 1959 and in the Coast Guard ....until 1961. In 1959 I was stationed on a weather cutter out of NYC, It was then I discovered that I got sicker than a dog on large vessels that moved! Finally got transferred and back to small boats. 1960 was spent in Niigata Japan and 1961 in Miami FL, tough duty but someone had to do it. IMO the whole era was summed up by "Ignorance is Bliss"! When everyone had a place and they stayed in it, or else.
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