‘I’m not ready’

“I want to write a piece about not being ready to deal with death,” writes our friend Mark Mullen, veteran Morlocks and Wallflowers drummer and all-around good egg. He’s given me generous permission both to quote him and to solicit the support of our age mates, who are learning to face this inevitable with greater frequency every year.

“My grandma died two days ago, and my aunt died a week ago, both to have services Sunday. …. Same day.

“I pretty much shut down and did not deal with it,” Mark writes. “Maybe if I wrote the story and had feedback and other people’s situation to see, maybe I would have dealt with it.

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Peter, Paul and Mom: Hippies of our lives

(Stop, children! What’s that sound? Robin Pugh Yi contemplates what’s goin’ down with the older generation.)

Peter, Paul and MaryI have tickets to go to a Peter, Paul and Mary concert with my parents in a couple of weeks.

It’s a family ritual. My husband gets tickets to performances by old hippies like Tom Paxton and Arlo Guthrie. I sigh and ask if he isn’t yet tired of Baby Boomers’ belief that they are inventors and keepers of the Holy Grail of Perpetual Adolescence. How can he maintain a straight face listening to “Hair” lyrics?

Then I go, because he has tickets. And it means a lot to Mom to go with us, enthusiastically sing along, and elbow me when I roll my eyes.

Then, inevitably, something breaks down my guard. Pete Seeger sings “Abiyoyo,” or Judy Collins sings “In My Life,” and I am once again a little girl in the Summer of Love. My parents, my aunts and uncles, their friends are so young, so sweet and earnest and unaware of everything to come. Sincerely trying to teach their children well.

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The Che Underground