Unity in 1984

Photo by Peter Feldstein for The Oxford Project.

January 3, 1974

Angel


TearDrop


Silent

The Freedom To Get A Mohawk At 6

Did you ever really want to do something when you were a child and your parents would always say no?

That didn't happen too often with my parents...

When I was about 10 and my youngest brother Cayenne was 6, he desperately wanted a mohawk.

Perhaps in New York City, or London at the time, this would not have been such a dramatic fashion statement. But for a lily white boy growing up among the cornfields of Iowa this certainly was not the normal request. (Nowadays it probably wouldn't seem unique at all.)

I'm not sure why my brother wanted a mohawk in the first place because neither I, nor our other brother Patrick-Spirit (PS) ever had our hair done that way...and certainly no others from the community did either. It was likely the combo effect of influences floating around our house and the popular culture of the time. My mom would often post colorful images on the fridge such as the one I remember of two London street punks with spiked purple hair, dog collars around their necks, walking down the street hand in hand. Or it could have been Mr. T and the A-Team show my brothers and I loved so much.

The hairdo didn't last more than a few months, and our parents seemed to get a kick out of it. Our grandparents didn't approve and even tried to take my brother to go get another hair cut once. And a lame portrait photographer tried to comb it down for Cayenne's annual school photo. But other than that it was just another hippie kid memory of childhood freedom...

(Photo courtesy of Peter Feldstein who photographed my brother at the time as part of his project: Everyone in Oxford, Iowa 1984.)

Copyright Unity

Car Surfing In Iowa

Is it irresponsible to let one's children stand on top of the hood of their car as they drive down a winding gravel road?

I ask this question, only because I have recently been reminiscing about one of my favorite summer past-times as a boy: car-surfing in Iowa.

It would work like this. When I was about 12 or so, my brothers and I would beg my mom to stop the car about a mile and a half from home so that we could surf the remaining road home. With no other cars on the road, my mom would pull over and we would jump out of the car Dukes of Hazard-style and take up our positions on the hood of the car. Sometimes standing as if on a surf board -- sometimes hanging off the hood like we were TJ Hooker in a chase -- we would ride the gravel roads home, wind blowing through our hair, dust trails in our wake.

Surfing the country roads truly was an exhilarating experience and it never grew old. It was best in the early summer evening, just before sunset. The air was warm then and the roads were free.

To put this all into context, my mom would cruise at only a few miles an hour until she knew we were steady. The pace would pick up to no more than 15 miles per hour - top speed - bugs rushing by and all. It was better than any carnival ride – we were in control!

No one was ever hurt and looking back I don’t recall any real danger. To some friends, these stories sound odd, but if you think about it, riding horses or 4-wheelers, or even surfing can be much more dangerous. Today seems like a different era, however: one more litigious, more controlling, more fearful. But are these times any more safe? Any more responsible?

Hippie Halloween - Cool Costumes But No Sugar!

One of the best times of year growing up in my family was Halloween. Cool costumes...happy parties...apple bobbing...hot cider...banjo playing by big bonfires.

But wait. No candy!

You see, my parents didn’t allow us to eat sugar back then.It was a time filled with mixed emotions for me. An exciting jumble of anticipation and superhero dreams. But at the core, times like Halloween also presented complex challenges more scary than the ghosts and goblins of the Day.

On these monumental days of tradition and consumerism, I became increasingly aware that my life was very much different from that of many of my friends.

Occasions like Halloween offered stark contrasts between the way my parents did things with the way some of our neighbors and classmate’s families did them. Don't get me wrong: being different wasn’t the challenge. The challenge was with the little things, like not getting to eat sugar on Halloween, or with costume malfunctions.
My mom was an expert at helping us design funky handmade costumes. They were cool and all, but I must admit I was always a little envious of the other kids who got to wear store-bought masks that looked more real. Take my Spiderman outfit when I was 10. It was a rustic patchwork that included loosely fitting dark blue tights featuring unevenly finger-painted stripes. I wore a black cotton ski mask and a red sweatshirt with embroidered spider-like shapes stitched across the chest. Looking back it worked out ok, but back then I used to imagine having a costume that really looked like the comic book hero. I would dream about the store-bought plastic costumes my friends got to wear.But the costumes were hardly the main thing me and my brothers were envious about. While lots of the other kids from our school were filling up bags with juicy candy, my parents had a different trick-or-treating route planned for us -- one a little more natural to say the least. The houses on my parents' route gave us fresh apples, hot cider, and bags of dried fruit. Instead of chocolate bars, we got carob bars and popcorn sprinkled with honey. Apparently, none of the homes on our journey used sugar in anything!

Let's be real. Even hippy kids want to trick or treat for a little sugar on Halloween.

But all in all, besides the funky costumes and sugarless treats, Halloween was full of good times. And I didn't realize it then, but it was many of those little differences at the time that have made me stronger and healthier today.

Hippie Kid Names...

Maybe it's the water in Iowa, I dunno. But many of my friends from childhood also have interesting and different names. Perhaps that's one reason why I never considered the name Unity as being out of the ordinary.

Here are some names of friends and family to give you an idea of what I mean:

Silas Starr
Orion
Keen
Pieta
Cecily
Pope
Sage
PatrickSpirit (bro)
Cayenne (bro)
Gardenia (sis)
Vadra (sis)

It should be an interesting study to see what all of these people name their own children one day...I will keep you posted.

Mom, Who Are The Bald Men In Orange Robes Chanting In Our Living Room?

All sorts of interesting people used to visit our farm when I was growing up.

I will never forget the morning I awoke to a strange noise humming from our living room which was located just under my room in our old creaky house. The sound was slow and steady and ebbed and flowed in a continuous but warm pattern. Even though the noise was barely audible, it managed to seep through the floor boards to surround me upstairs. I wasn't quite sure what the noise was and had never heard such an amazing sound before.

The sun hadn't risen yet, but the sky was on the cusp of turning light. I peaked out my window and saw orange streaks burst through the darkness. It was much too early for me to wake up and it was cold outside of my covers. But I had to see what could be making such sound from below. I pulled myself out of bed and tip-toed down the stairs.

The humming noise grew more powerful as I walked toward the living room. I peaked around the corner to see what was about. What I saw were a group of six friendly looking bald men dressed in beautiful orange robes sitting in a circle with their legs crossed and eyes closed. No one seemed to notice me at all and I tried not to let the floor creak beneath my feet. I just sat and listened from afar with one eye peering around the doorway. I must have stood there and watched the men chant for twenty minutes before seeing anyone of them make a movement. They all sat totally still, amidst fumes of incense sparkling on our woodstove.

The sun came up and the men in robes started to move. Before they noticed me, I skedaddled up the stairs and jumped right back into bed wondering what the heck was going on down in my living room so early in the morning. The ominous sound seemed to keep me warm though, and I fell right back to sleep no problem at all. Later that day I asked my mom what was going on. She simply explained that we had some friendly monks visiting us from Asia and that they were praying for world peace. Ok I said...

Mom and Pop, Grant Wood Style

I love this image for many reasons. It tells so many stories. Mom, probably just in from her garden, wields a pitchfork with grace and style. The late afternoon sun glows red off Pop's ZZ Top beard. And one of my parent's friends contemplates life off in the distance. Everyone seems happy and content, relaxed and at ease on the farm...
Copyright Unity

Dumb Dumb Daycare

The first school I went to was called Dumb Dumb Daycare.

I don't remember much about the place, except that it had a big back yard and it is where I met a great group of friends, many of whom I still hang out with to this day.

What I remember most about Dumb Dumb is how it was named. Basically, the story goes like this:

The founders of the school decided that the children should be in charge of naming the place. After all, it was as much the students school and their school. So just before nap time one day, the teachers convened a meeting with all of the kids to tell them the news. They told us that the first words one of us blurted out would become the new name of our school.

One of my friends immediately said: That's Dumb Dumb.

The founders stuck to their word, and taught us all a valuable lesson: be careful what you say!

Food Club And Never Running Our Of Peanut Butter

I don't remember our family going to the grocery store much when I was a kid. I guess that's because we had Food Club.

What's Food Club you ask?

Well, basically Food Club was a small group of my parent's friends who would get together every so often to order hard-to-get organic groceries and dry-goods at a discount.

That's right, many years before there was a Wal-Mart in our neck of the woods, my parents and their friends were buying 5-gallon buckets of peanut butter, slats of yogurt, and 10 lb. bricks of cheese. Naturally, it was ALL natural.

Here is how Food Club worked. Someone, (I'm not quite sure who, because the process never seemed that structured), would organize and host a Food Club approximately every month. At the meeting, each family would submit their wish list of groceries. A certain amount of bartering and shuffeling would occur, so everyone could get the types of food and quantities they wanted. Then, as a group, Food Club would place one massive order for the next month's delivery.

The second part of the meeting was the fun part. The food from the previous order was divvied up and taken home. I remember a good vibe at home on Food Club day. The house always seemed to warm up when we were flush with food. And the first few days were great because my two bros and I didn't have to ration our stashes as much. You see, each of us boys would get a certain number of Sasporilla Sodas, or Bags of Bandito Corn Chips, or Carob Bars to last us until the next Food Club gathering.

By the end of the month though, pickings were slim. I remember eating lots of grilled cheese sandwiches, and lots of things made from pinto beans.

And no matter how hard we tried, we never ever ran out of Peanut Butter...