"were you a hippie?" vignette

8/9/2019 "Were You a Hippie?" vignette

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Were You a Hippie?

Ms. Williams, were you a hippie?, one of my students asked last

Spring. Oh, I'll bring in a photograph and you can decide for yourself, I

replied.

Another student, Chris, who knows me very well and is the most

conservative person Ive ever known, answered, Ms. Williams, you are still

a hippie, and thats perfectly alright. Chris has always been wise beyond his

years.


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The Google dictionary definition of a hippie/s is: Hippies were

young people in the 1960s and 1970s who rejected conventional ways of

living, dressing, and behaving, and tried to live a life based on peace and

love. Hippies often had long hair and many took drugs. I don't know why,

but every single time I read that definition, the last part comes off as and

took many drugs.

The next day when I showed several students the photograph of

myself from 1972, one girl said, That doesn't look anything like you. I

responded, Give yourself forty years and see if you look the same. I

looked like many of us did back then: a pretty, slender, wide-eyed young

lady, with hair down to my waist, parted in the middle. My 120-pound figure

resembled that of The Venus De Milo.

In those days, my favorite outfit, which I wore when I wanted to get

dressed up, was a black cotton turtle neck sweater and a flowing knee-length

vest, with large green and black herringbone patterns. Matching wide

bell-bottom pants and tan lace-up leather boots completed the look.

When my two sons were in their early teens, we were purchasing a

new van, and the salesman was a former student of mine from my first year

of teaching, 1971. When he was in his office alone with the boys, he told

them, Your mother used to be a real Fox, back in the day. They


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snickered about that all the way home, and still get a good laugh reliving the

moment. No one is supposed to say that about your mom.

Often I was referred to as the hippie on the staff when I started

teaching. I remember Margaret, one of the more revered older teachers,

approaching me in the hall one day. As if she were the designated

spokesperson for a group, she said, Several of us have been discussing this,

and we think you need to gain some weight. And so I did.

Like many of us, I am right on track in upholding the frequently-used

statistic that adults usually gain two pounds a year. Instead of looking like

The Venus de Milo, I now look in the mirror and see more of a resemblance

to The Venus of Willendorf. I take some comfort in knowing that she was a

symbol of beauty 26,000 years ago.

I no longer have the hair down to my waist. This is still shocking to

most people, since that was my signature look for more than thirty years.

The first summer when I was in grad school, I had an ah ha moment about

my hair. My schedule was so grueling, every waking moment was precious.

It became more and more absurd to blow dry my long thick hair for twenty

minutes every morning, only to pull it back in a pony-tail. The only thing

that made sense was to get it whacked off.

These days I wear a very short buzz cut that feels too long when it


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grows out much more than a half an inch. It seems like the older you get, the

more you realize that the length of a person's hair, just like their clothes and

outwardly appearances, doesn't have much to do with what that person is

really all about.

Frequently acquaintances I run into have no idea who I am until they

hear my voice. Often these are people who know me very well, but just

dont recognize me without the long hair. They are shocked and often

embarrassed that they didnt recognize me. I dont mind it really, Ive

actually enjoyed having a little anonymity.

Over the years I have developed a horrible aversion to clothes. I

especially dread shopping for clothes. Its as if the department stores have

three floors of ugly on display. Its difficult to find anything that isnt

polyester or decorated with sequins and gold glittery paint. I am none of

those things, and feel uncomfortable wearing them.

When I was coaching a middle school forensics team several years

ago, one of my students was competing in the Impromptu category. In

this division, students are given well-known phrases on which they have to

give an impromptu speech. My student drew the phrase, Beauty is Only

Skin Deep. I was flabbergasted when she started giving her speech. She

had no clue what that phrase meant, and spoke about it as if it had a literal


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meaning.

Her generation may not know what Beautys Only Skin Deep

means. Ours certainly does. And Im glad the Temptations did too.

"were you a hippie?" vignette

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