Cirque Du Soleil

Recently we went to the Beatles Love Cirque Du Soleil. Since unlike many people I actually was 21 in 1969 I found it brought tears to my eyes to relive those times. The sound and music and acrobats and dancers were really amazing and the many many special effects were really amazing. But the cathartic nature of cleansing all those feelings of those times both good and bad took me  to how I and those my age felt about everything during those times. I felt as I walked out that I had revisited the 1960s one last time.

In 1964 the Beatles had the front cover of either Post or Life magazine which were two of the most read and popular event magazines of those times. I was  16 years old over at my friend's house working on rebuilding the transmission of a 1953 Mecury that belonged to my friend Mike.   The magazine arrived and my friend Mike and I were amazed at the phenomenon of the Beatles. A year or two later Mike wanted me to come hear his latest record album, Sargent Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. I looked at the decorated record album cover with all the Beatles dressed up in military band type of outfits out of another era like John Phillips Souza and wondered what to make of all that. However, little did I know how iconic this look would become at the time. The long hair era first started with the Beatles in 1964. Boys started to want to wear their hair longer to wear the mop cut of the Beatles. Kids were kicked out of my high school if their hair went below their collar if they were boys. Girls couldn't wear pants to school then and if their dresses were shorter than their knees they were expelled. If girls wore too tight of sweaters that revealed their forms too much or if their skirts or dresses were too tight they were sent home or expelled. So many social norms and changes happened and many many people suffered in innumerable ways to create the changes so many take for granted today. Most are completely unaware just how much anger and hope and suffering went into creating the world we live in not only in my generation but also before us during world war II all the way back to the Revolutionary War. It all boggles the mind to contemplate even what my generation endured let along present and previous generations. It is not possible to fully emotionally contemplate without going mad. But an intellectual encompassing is necessary to learn to respect all that America and the whole world is and to fully appreciate it.