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Counter-Culturalism flourished - Weebly.com
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What Did Saroyan Say?
by Elsa Fernandez
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"If you're not alive, San Francisco will bring you to life." William Saroyan
After 12 years at Catholic school with the nuns, I headed away from Mumbai, India and flew 8400 miles across the Pacific to a city fragrant with patchouli oil and sunny chants from Hare Krishnas. Ginsburg, Kerouac, Burroughs—hedonists, nonconformists, writers. And Lawrence Ferlinghetti, in the hallowed literary mecca he created—City Lights Bookstore. Three floors of shelves and books, by Writers of the Beat generation, where poetry and politics held hands. Brash language and metaphysics reshaped the elegance of the classics. Counter-Culturalism flourished—we grooved to Ravi Shankar's sitar music, smoked hashish in genuine Indian hookahs, scribbled dreams into kinetic words, intense writing fueled by LSD. Black turtlenecked Beatniks, tie-dyed Hippies sustained by cannabis and cornflakes. Archbishop M. spoke at our graduation. But he was drunk so we left. Across from City Lights, a familiar face grinned from a billboard at the Garden of Eden Strip Club. We recognized Patrick, college pal, now fleshpot headliner, his virile assets on full display. A reminder to us—paychecks were now a priority. That summer I found a job— as janitor at the Old Family Dog on Ocean Beach. Perks included sitting in at rehearsals of Grace Slick and Jefferson Airplane, daily lunch from Bull Pupp—where $2 bought me two of the biggest tacos to be had in San Francisco. I knew that a "real" job would soon be in the cards for me. But for that glorious summer after graduation, I lived in what Ferlinghetti described "this far-out city on the left side of the world.” Nothing else mattered. |
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