UNTIL DEATH.... excerpt

The VietNam war raged on. I protested, everybody LINK TEXT HERE ▼

protested, - almost everyone

- ; people marching, teenagers carrying signs, cops carrying unholstered guns, crowds shouting, hippies singing out of tune, very loud rock and roll music blasting the air waves, a message in all the songs, coast to coast runaways, every other home grieving dead sons, children spreading love and peace, people fighting, people crying,,, The war raged on and on....

A time of hot pants and mini skirts, of free love and flower children, bikers and hippies, and drugs to make the world more beautiful. The big city concrete sidewalks pleasantly burned the soles of my barefeet and the brilliant rays from the summer sun streaked my hair, turned my skin to tan. A jiggle, a certain bounce to my walk. I felt the ends of my long, heavy hair slapping my bare back and waist in tune with my stride. I was eighteen, living the sixties:. Invincible, eternal. As Steppenwolf said, I was "never gonna die!" Every teen-aged cell in my body boasted of youth and strength and fearlessness and beauty, everything wild and free and good. The world was a mess but I was here in America - FREE. Free to walk the Atlanta streets without fear and to live each moment as I wished.

" Wanna ride, baby?", " Hey, little darling; Come with me. I'll take you any where you wanna go", " Where ya going, sweetheart? Let me give you a ride, hop in , honey"- it all reached my ears as I turned my head in mock pretence not to hear. According to my childhood teachngs I was suppossed to be insulted by such attention but my feet barely touched the pavement so lighthearted and nonchalant was my step as I turned my head away from the remarks like a good little girl. One had only to look into my laughing, shining eyes to know I was complimented, not insulted. My own personal secret.

I was high then, VERY high, but not on manmade chemical drugs or even on any of nature's many pharmaceutical choices. I was high on death and life anew.The Jehovah's Witnesses had just recently put me to death by way of a process they called " dis-fellowshipment ". I was as dead to my family and all the other J. W.s - and these were the only people I knew on the face of this earth. I felt a lot of trauma at first but shortly after that I felt the manicals and prison bars dissappearing, Man had removed himself from that spot that stood directly between myself and God. Judgement day was over for me but instead of losing God I felt His presence still even if I didn't exactly know His true opinion of me at this particular stage.The point was that by casting me out they also gave up their "God-given" rights to control me: my emotions, my every thought, my actions, my life's choices - ALL of me. So for the time being I felt like a bird let out of a cage, fearlessly trying out the wings that before this time I never knew I had. That was all I had, these undeveloped wings and a birthing of a new self that, at first, almost overwhelmed me with a sense of bouyancy and unbridled freedom.

I learned what it was to be a carefree, romping filly,celebrating a new life filled with the magic of youth and unbridled freedom of spirit.This filly believed all evil was behind her now.. Then one night she met the stallion she wanted to sire all her offspring. Terry.

He loved her, made love to her, put her on a pedistal, and took possession of her. He'd never known anything so pure and innocent, she'd never felt so safe. We, Terry and I, after having begun our long personal journey together that magical night at Marie's pool party, settled in to planting our garden, sowing our future with seeds we had gathered and saved just for this purpose: to build a new life in the name of love of life and the ever-growing human race.