The End of my Hippie Fascination

Ever since I developed an appreciation for classic rock, I have had an embarrassingly powerful fascination with the hippie movement of the ‘70s.  How I longed to enter a time capsule and transport myself back to that era and hang out in Haight-Ashbury with the Grateful Dead.  I’d spend my days in the park smoking pot and doing acid.  We’d talk of things that matter.  My parents find this obsession with the era of their youth confounding.

I think the predominate cause for my infatuation was a desperate longing to see my favorite bands perform in their heyday.  Oh, what I wouldn’t give to see Pink Floyd stage The Wall, or Hendrix light his guitar on fire, or The Beatles perform Sgt. Pepper.  That last one is a joke.  If you don’t get it, you’re not a true Beatles fan.

As the localized version of Occupy Wall Street, Occupy Salt Lake, set up camp in one of the downtown parks, I came to the sudden realization that aside from bell bottoms, there is no real difference between these jobless activists and the hippies of the ‘70s.  It was then that I reached the epiphany that I have absolutely no desire to leave my job and go live in the park with a bunch of voluntary homeless hipsters feuding with involuntary homeless bums.

This is by no means meant to be political.  I neither despise, nor fully endorse OWS.  I also recognize that calling them all jobless is a huge generalization.  The point is, they have helped me get over a semi-childish fascination, and I thank them for that.  I will always love the ‘Stones, but I’ll enjoy them while I design a PCB, not while hitting acid. Does that make me part of the 99%?  Absolutely.