Flower Power

Donovan: Ferris Wheel

People from a planet without flowers would think
we must be mad with joy the whole time
to have such things about us.
--Iris Murdoch

Jefferson Airplane: Fat Angel

Youngbloods: Get Together

It seems like a lifetime,
or at least a Main Era —
the kind of peak
that never comes again.
San Francisco in
the middle sixties
was a very special
time and place
to be a part of.
Maybe it meant something.
Maybe not,
in the long run...
but no explanation,
no mix of words
or music or memories
can touch that sense of
knowing that you
were there and alive
in that corner of time
and the world.
Whatever it meant...
There was madness in any direction, at any hour. You could strike sparks anywhere. There was a fantastic universal sense that whatever we were doing was right, that we were winning...
And that, I think, was the handle — that sense of inevitable victory over the forces of Old and Evil. Not in any mean or military sense; we didn't need that. Our energy would simply PREVAIL. There was no point in fighting — on our side or theirs. We had all the momentum; we were riding the crest of a high and beautiful wave...
So now, less than five years later, you can go up on a steep hill in Las Vegas and look West, and with the right kind of eyes you can almost see the high water mark — that place where the wave finally broke, and rolled back.
--Hunter S. Thompson