Bell bottoms are making a comeback. I’m not sure if this is
making me feel old or young again? I save everything so for me it’s not about
buying a new pair of bells, but about reaching into the darkest recesses of my closet
and pulling out the dozen pair of bells I still own. With delight I carefully unfold
each pair realizing that I don’t need to spend any money to be in style… the
hippie look has always been in style for me.
As I try on my bells I flash back (no pun intended) to my youthful
carefree days as a young hippie. Oh the beads, the fringe and the bells! Of course
this was met with so much resistance from our parents; just as the earlier
phase of the Beatles, miniskirts and Go Go boots.
My first pair of bell bottom pants was bought at the Navy
Exchange which was the only place to get bell bottoms. I bought a pair of
sailor denim bells, took them home and altered them to fit my feminine frame.
Soon after that Head Shops began to pop up with all the beads, fringe and bell
bottoms a girl could want. (Anyone remember head shops? They sold more than
bells!) At last I found my hippie niche! Woodstock here I come! Bells, beads,
sandals and more I danced in the mud, hugged perfect strangers and never
regretted that weekend at Woodstock.
However, before long bell bottoms went main stream and that ended
the hippie era. Or may-be it was just time to grow up and get responsible?
Now once again the bells are coming back to main stream and
I must admit I love it. When I wear my bells I feel young again. I feel a sense
of rebellion, curiosity, peace and love. And with all this new found sense of
youth I realize that old hippies never die. They just go dormant for a while. In the
eighties we all disguised ourselves as mainstream because it was easier to
conform than keep pushing to the edge.
Responsibility for children, mortgages and retirement planning gave precedence
over love and peace. Maturity teaches you that life is not the idealistic
fantasy of the young, but a long process of learning to conform, compromise,
negotiate and get involved rather than drop out.
So I raised a family, paid my taxes, voted and lived as a
law abiding citizen. But now the bells are coming out and I feel that
anti-establishment, free loving, and rebellious young hippie emerging from the
back of my closet. But she has aged. Her hair has flecks of grey and her body
is wrinkling and crinkling into a senior citizen. She’s not about to go and sit
in a pile of mud dancing and screaming to the beat of the Who. But she will
always love rock and roll, incense and brownies.
I look at myself in the mirror all dressed out in my bells
and I can’t believe how fast the years have passed. Here I am a Grandmother
with a wild history of free love, anti-war rebellion and well you know all that
“stuff” we hippies did…
Never throw away your bell bottoms. They’re a symbol of
youth. As long as you have them they will remind you that deep inside of you
there still is that young hippie with all the idealistic notions of a better
world through peace and love. And you know what? With all the experience and
all the wisdom I’ve gained over the last several decades I still believe that
the world would be a better place if the hippies in bell bottoms ran the world.
Peace would reign, love would be everywhere, we would eat healthy and we would be
more concerned with the betterment of humanity than accumulating a bunch of
stuff that only gets thrown away when you die. The more you own, what you own,
owns you!
Idealism, they say, is reserved for the young. This
unrealistic pursuit of ideal standards fueled by emotions and hormones is
vested in naiveté. Equality is what we
all want. But equality is an elusive creature. It’s easy to be rebellious and
idealistic when you have nothing to lose. However, when your parents threaten
to cut off your support line conformity most always rules.
Unfortunately materialism
always usurps ideology. Money, politics and greed are mightily powerful force
against a band of hippie. Conformity brought with it the era of the yuppies and
the frantic rush to get rich. Brief cases, suspenders and wingtips replaced
backpacks, beads and sandals. Then the yuppie era went bust and we all wondered
what the hell went wrong. It’s just a recession and recessions happen over and
over again. We learned a valuable
lesson; things go up and things go down. We learned to ride out the roller
coaster ride of the capitalistic market until one day without warning the bell bottoms
came back.
This sliding back of time causes one to pause and reflect. Wisdom
teaches you that life without music, love and peace is not really worth living.
So don’t throw away your bell bottoms. They symbolize a sense of youthful
freedom and that sense of youthful freedom will always keep you young at heart.
Doctor Lynn
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