Here's why I know that hope for peace, love and tolerance lives on
How could so many of us live with so much hope in our hearts?
America’s streets and storefronts had burned with anger after the man who embodied peace and civil rights for all, Martin Luther King, was assassinated.
Tens of thousands of us were being killed in the Vietnam War – which moved hundreds of thousands of us to march in those streets to protest the war - and thousands more of us to protest the protestors.
And yet as one of the most turbulent decades in history came to end, hope lived in our hearts. As sure as a sunrise, we just knew we could change the world and make it a better, more peaceful place.
That hope culminated in the gathering of nearly a half million of us that would come to symbolize peace and love - the 1969 Woodstock festival. It kicked off 53 years ago Aug. 15 on a rolling farm field in the Sullivan County Town of Bethel that’s now the site of Bethel Woods Center for the Arts.
Woodstock became so synonymous with goodness, it’s now a part of our language as a symbol for any peaceful, joyous gathering, such as Popestock, Foodstock or Kidstock. Contrast that with another momentous event of the era whose suffix has come to symbolize a scandal – Watergate, as in Bridgegate or Irangate.
Where has that hope in our hearts gone? Have we lost the ability to aspire to ideals?
We’re ravaged by diseases that just won’t quit – and bitterly divided about what to do about them. Russia is murdering thousands of innocent men, women and children in Ukraine, in a genocidal invasion. Millions of us believe a lie about a stolen election without a shred of proof. Is it any wonder almost two thirds of us fear for the future, according to a Pew Research Center poll?
Yet that heartbeat of hope still beats within us. You can just about feel it when you check out Bethel Woods’ billboard-size mural with handwritten messages at the monument at the site of the 1969 Woodstock festival.
I went there last year and was inspired by messages like “Be Kind,” “Be a Good Person” and this quote from a song by Nick Lowe that Elvis Costello made famous: “What’s so funny ‘bout peace, love and understanding?”
And even though this year’s genocidal war, never-ending pandemic and rampant conspiracy theories seem like a dark drone of negativity, that mural with bright painted flowers by Kayli Hussey is still chock full of messages reflecting the better selves that live within us, no matter where we are.
“Woodstock was big, but love is bigger,” wrote Violet (or maybe Maya, it’s hard to tell from the writing).
“Peace and love to all mankind,” wrote “Professor Adam Smasher,” one of a slew of similar messages.
In a contemporary nod to the reality of yet another thing that many of us worry about – inflation – there was this, from Alex and Femary:
“Love, health and wealth.”
Why, there was even one that conjured the almost mystical magic that Woodstock still evokes in so many of us:
“Sebastian 2023,” it reads, making you first think it was written by some spaced out hippie, until you see this just below the name and year: “We have time machines.”
Hey, I know that reading messages about peace and love on a mural won’t change the world.
But they remind us that despite the seemingly steady drumbeat of despair, hope still beats in our hearts – which may be why that same Pew poll said that despite our fear for the future, most of us still felt this year would be better than last year.
You can feel that heartbeat of hope even if you don’t get back to Woodstock.
You can feel it in the electric touch of the one you love.
You can feel it in the spontaneous smile of a baby who suddenly recognizes her mom or dad.
And you can feel that heartbeat of hope just knowing that the sun will rise tomorrow, heralding a new day of possibility.
steveisrael53@outlook.com
This article originally appeared on Times Herald-Record: Woodstock vibes: peace, love and hope for the future remain strong
