PAGAN
LOVE AND WILDING HEARTS
11.
Earth People’s Park
The most
extraordinary thing about Earth People’s Park was that its basic charter rebuked the
tyranny commonly found in experimental communities everywhere else; and that was indeed a
remarkable thing. I have never understood why intelligent people would need an asshole
running around thinking he was God anyway. It’s superfluous.
One only need to
have participated in a few of those avant-guard experiments to have become confounded by
the blaring facts of corrupted spirit and power politics that seemed to propel
megalomaniacs into influencial capacities—which ultimately turned the most hopeful
alternative societies into just more stupid bureaucracies not really different from
anything else.
It hurts to
witness the failure of our dreams! The daily strangling of free spirit villainously
contradicts our innermost beliefs that Love will bond us all in perfect human harmony. Yet
such is the common fare we come to accept as inevitable when diverse peoples aggregate in
small hippy scenes and try to do things together like cook or clean or build or plant or
make love.
But Earth
People’s Park was different. The six-hundred acres were spacious enough so that
people weren’t forced to sit squashed with each other in the same close room until
one brain ate the other brain. In fact one of the first rules at Earth People’s Park
was that no dwelling was to be built within sight of another. Clans were allowed their
autonomy. People were allowed their idiosyncrasies—as long as they didn’t
interfere with others. Families were encouraged to build cabins or geodesic domes, clear
land, plant crops, and make their own rules. And self-acclaimed prophets were encouraged
to SHUT-UP!!!
“Idiosyncrasies”
is a key word—except that these people were a heck of a lot more idiosyncratic than
the people to whom words like that are normally applied. These characters were to become
my friends, many of whom remain so today. I will relate here some early impressions.
I met John Pratt
when I first came to the land. He was living in a very small triangular structure with a
wood stove. Reverend John Pratt. Preacher
John. As earthy a man as you will ever find. He never liked me too much; I was too pagan
and he was too Christian. But John would probably never fail a friend. In fact he would
befriend someone whether they saw eye to eye about religion or not. I saw him a couple
years ago whittling with some children. He hadn’t changed any in all the years.
John likes wine
like most of us. We drank many gallons of wine.
He is a tall
man; he wears a long coat. He reminds me of Abraham Lincoln. In more ways than one. He has a sense of humor
that cuts to the bone and he gets angry at anyone who doesn’t love Jesus. But he even
gives sinners their space. He’s tough as nails and strong as an ox. Everyone gives
him his space, too.
Preacher John
and Kenny Carlson were sharing a bottle when I arrived. I think Robin was there too. They
each have their part of the story; I’ll get to them. They laughed when I asked what I
had to do to live there.
“You’re
here aren’t you?” John asked me.
“Yeah, I
guess I am!” I answered.
“Well........
You’re living, aren’t you?” he asked again.
“Yeah, I
do believe I am living...” I answered.
“Well
then, it appears you are living here, doesn’t it?” he asked, looking at me
with a twinkle in his eye to see if I got his little joke.
“I see
what you mean...” I laughed.
“Good.
now that that’s settled. Would you like to share a little wine with us?”
“Yeah, I do
believe I would.” I told him.
They told me
about a teepee covered with transparent plastic that I could live in since no one else was
using it. I went and checked it out. What a pretty sight, a transparent teepee in the
woods with a field of spring flowers right in front. I rolled out my stuff and knew I was
home.
I had a
cigarette habit. In prison, even in the hole every prisoner got two things: a free Bible
and free cigarettes. It’s crazy. I developed a cigarette habit in prison! Boredom and
anxiety made me restart a habit I had thought would be gone forever. Prison had finally
passed behind me but --the damn cigarette habit firmly continued to enslave me. I knew as
soon as I found a peaceful place where I could restore my own personal strength I would
quit forever. When I saw the transparent teepee I knew my stupid habit would soon be
behind me.
There was
something else: that headache I mentioned... It had not gone away. When I arrived at EPP I
still had it—every hour of every day. Once
I was settled in the teepee I gave myself a prescription that I believed would cure me:
quit smoking, eat good food, drink a little wine, relax in the beauty of the woods, share
some laughter with good friends. And one
thing more -- smoke half a joint of home-grown pot every day. Lay back and watch the birds
in the branches of the trees through the plastic and let that medicine work on the
headache. I started feeling better right away.
I had a campfire
in the middle of my teepee; the smoke swirled out the top. To anyone passing by on the Ho
Chi Mihn trail the fire glowed and flickered in the plastic like a huge incandescent bulb.
The covering kept the warmth inside nicely. I could cook my meals in comfort surrounded by
beauty, watching tree branches swaying in the winds. I heard every bird that sang in any
tree within half-a-mile; I was surrounded by a veritable flood of birdsong at all times.
When the rain fell I remained warm and dry laying in my sleeping bag upon a mattress of
fragrant pine boughs. The patter of the rain upon the plastic was pleasing to my ears and
I slept in peace like a child. When I awoke my guitar was always beside me. No one would
be disturbed by my music if I chose to attempt repetitive practicing. My nearest neighbor
was too far away to hear.
Tom Hennig heard
my music from the trail and came to visit. He lived nearby with his wife and children.
They had one of the largest houses, and seemed the most industrious: he had a team of
horses and milk goats and chickens and a big vegetable garden—and he grew some fine
pot. Whenever he came to visit he brought a
little for me and if I ran out I only had to go visit him and ask and he would happily get
me some more. It was a neighborly thing. I
tell you I came to love Tom Hennig and his wife Linda and their children, Kieth and Laura.
He was a green Baret in Viet Nam. He drank to help him deal with his nightmares. My friend
Tom is dead now; he died of alcoholism in 1990.
It
was thanks to Tom and Linda and all my other- friends at. EPP that my dreadful headache
finally went away.
***
Wally and Marie
lived in a large yellow schoolbus with a pack of children over near a hill that was
covered with blueberries. They gave their children beautiful names: Misty. Sundove, and
Lilac. I bounced them on my knee.
Wally was (and
is) one of those very objective and human father figures who make our culture stand out as
something special. A hard worker not only on his own projects but also on those that
benefited the community. Although he was a young man he had a long bushy beard that
reached to his waist.
His
wife Marie was (and is) one of the beauties of our world. She was full to the brim with
petite Earthmother grace that made us hungry to look at her without understanding what we
were hungry for. Her womanly beauty was like a moonlit river and the brothers were
attracted to her as if in a state of rapture. Sometimes she had to beg, plead, cajole and
threaten them to get them away from her so she could take care of her children. She was
often heard to say,
“Yeah,
I got forty-seven husbands and none of the fringe benefits!”
Some EPP men
looked at a brother like Wally as though he were someone who had eaten all the candy
without sharing it because he had such a beautiful sister all to himself. Actually there
were many who fervently believed the state of marriage was exactly that: theft to remove a
woman from the herd and place her permanently in a man’s private pasture. Many
vehemently decried marriage and paid no respect to anyone who claimed its sanctuary.
Myself, I kind of lived in both worlds, sometimes vouching for the one side, sometimes the
other. But basically I sided with Wally and Marie and the other married couples on the
land because deep inside my heart that’s what I really wanted for myself as well. So,
as far as I was concerned forest flower Marie was one of the beauties we were fortunate
enough to be able to share a hug with -- a sacred blessing that we all shared in this
spiritland.
Hugging saved us
all. Hugging restored our contact with those sisters with whom we felt such an astral
connection, such forbidden magnetism. Hugging healed our separation. Hugging blessed us
with real friendship. The brothers hugged too. And so we could understand Wally and the
way he loved Marie and his children; and we knew his family was our extended family.
And extended
families were all one big family. Meals were sometimes shared, coffee and tea were
available when someone stopped by. Knowledge
and skills were taught freely to one another. Seating space in automobiles going to town
was first come, first served. Chores and projects were accomplished by willing volunteers.
And Marie danced and sang as she cooked, washed and cared for her family and we smiled
when we noticed her as we walked by their yellow bus beside the blueberry patch.
Everyone
respected her except Buddha. He slipped his hand under her blouse and grabbed a tit. So
she picked up a knife and threatened to remove his only claim to fame. So even he came to
admire her from a distance.
Buddha was
frequent company in my teepee in the beginning before I knew better. He was the least
companionable person anyone would ever want for company; but he was a funny character. An
unabashed nudist—he had a method to his madness. He had the wonderful good fortune of possessing one of those funny things envied by
most other men and quite a few women—an absolutely huge cock. Giant-sized. After the
initial shock to my psyche wore off I found
it absolutely hillarious. It was especially amusing to observe its effect on new-comer
sisters when they first laid eyes on him... it... The lucky bastard.
From the start I
found myself cooking meals for him. Someone had to do it. He couldn’t do anything for
himself. All he could do was grab tits and ass. Oh, he scored more than most men; that
only figured considering the shock value of what he had and how its gaudy appearance
seemed to numb women’s sensibilities long enough to leave them totally vulnerable to
his suave catlike manipulations.
Toni Buddha
always arrived naked with the sun. He was a handsome yogi with the most terrific tan
anyone has ever seen; a lion’s mane, a pointed beard, fierce brown eyes, and a rather
beautiful Semitic face. His body was mildly muscular, taut and perfect. He was smart
enough to use those attributes to his best advantage, making himself as obvious as
possible in the social gatherings doing his limber yoga postures in the center of
everyone. New people arrived at EPP every day and he was an unoffical greeter; basically
he wanted to be the first to scope the new chicks. Yes, he was successful.
But hungry.
Women ran to him like fleas to a dog but after the effects of their encounter wore off,
which didn’t take long, they ran away from him like mice from a cat. After all, when
the sex is over and a woman wants to talk about the real things in life she isn’t
going to be real happy to discover this new Indian God she has just given her best moves
to—can talk about nothing but himself. That was Toni Buddha to a T. If it
wasn’t about him it wasn’t worth discussing. That would have been bad enough all
by itself except that unfortunately he was also significantly
“Could
I have another piece of that toast? Oh, thank you. Please pass the jam, too. What’s
in that pot?”
If it was up to
the women he laid to feed him he would have starved to death. Which is probably why he was
so thin. So he made the rounds of all the homes at EPP. It wouldn’t have been so bad
if he had knocked first or if he just came in when the person were at home but not Buddha.
He was beyond such earthly convention. He always just walked in and ate everything he
could find. You would arrive home and there he would be sitting there with all your food
open in front of him, asking you why you were out of honey?
The only time
his presence was absolutely prohibited was when I had a girl over and I wanted to be
alone. But, his attitude was simply: why would she want to be with me after she met him?
He’d just ignore my protests and sit there talking about himself to the girl who, if
she hadn’t met him before, was probably soon swept away into his conversation and
then they would stroll out together hand in hand to find some private space of their own.
More than once he used his meaty magic to steal my female visitor away from my teepee.
What a skinny pig he was then!!
The sisters
didn’t just fuck and fly from Buddha though. They did it from everyone, giving
maximum pleasure and then splitting to find someone else. It was one of the bummers that
made casual sex so disconcerting and empty—so graceless. Like we weren’t worth
their time except to fill their needs. Acid and marijuana and hash were their main needs.
They would do anything for drugs. And they would stay with anyone as long as the stash
held out; but when it was gone they would be gone soon after, looking for a new supplier.
So the guys who
had figured out how to keep an abundant permanent stash never suffered for lack of social
adventure. Sex was easy and free. But dope
was much more important than sex. I always thought that was odd. Even dumb. Sex is the
best.
And what is
really something to think about is that with an attitude like I had on that subject, I was
really kind of unique.
Because EPP was not
a sex society! NO!! It was a dope society where sex was just a superfluous extra
privilege that largely depended upon a person’s drug supply. So I was a sexualist
stowed-away in a drug culture, a cat in Dogpatch so to speak. I guess you could say I was
a purist. A pure pagan. A pagan puritan. Yeah.
Actually there
were many who put loving before dope. There were some really beautiful people coupled-up
on the land making babies.
Robin and Sandy
were two I would have bet money on to go all the way to old-age together. Two thin young
people with long dark hair and wearing long dark coats and patchpants. I always thought
they looked like a couple of clarinets walking side by side right out of a Walt Disney
cartoon. Sandy was so pretty she always made me catch my breath, she walked arm in arm
with Robin at all times, curling up to him wherever they stood or sat as if they were two
rag dolls God was playing with. And Robin was such an easy-going thoughtful kind of
person. He always wanted to resolve differences; always wanted to point the way to
understanding and tolerance. If those qualities rank above what one normally might expect
to find in untamed fringes I would indeed expect a couple like them to last. They lasted a
year. Sandy kept their daughter. Robin cried himself to sleep for a decade. He’s
still my friend today. (Even if he won’t let me borrow his camcorder when mine is
broken!!!)
James and Paula
had six children on the land. James delivered them all himself. He had to build the
biggest house on the land just to hold them, a huge octagonal log cabin. Now there is the
basis of a solid relationship! Such a mover, that James! I helped him carry some of the
huge logs he used for the walls. When there was no one to help him he did it himself. Or
his strong wife Paula helped. Strong enough to bare six children in the woods far from a
town or hospital: strong enough to carry logs. Paula: always ready with hot dishes for pot
luck suppers—and a fresh salad from her garden; always wearing a rumpled dress with a
child on her hip and one or two trailing behind hanging on to her hand: always a sister to
the sisters; a far-seeing gaze and a pretty laugh; a strong-minded woman I for one did not
ever want to get on the wrong side of. James and Paula: after twenty years of marriage,
their children all raised—in 1991 they split up. She left him, got herself a twenty
year old boyfriend; no problem good looking as she is. James cried on my shoulder. I would
of bet a million bucks I would never see that man cry. But maybe after twenty years of
long-suffering and hardship she deserved a little fun.
***
I heard a noise
one morning and took a walk behind my teepee to see what it was. A young woman was
squatting in the mud digging up a small field, crumpling clods in her hands, tossing rocks
over into a pile. I returned several times and marveled the way she just kept at it like a
human tractor. She probably weighed a hundred pounds, all skin and muscle.
Later I found
out from people that everyone who knew her would easily bet money she could outwork any
man. I don’t know where she got the energy. I saw her bury a van once in a stone
field so she could have an underground root cellar. She was an outspoken and even openly
defiant vegetarian, and probably many other things I will never know. She lived
underground like a rabbit in a hole she had dug in the earth. Her boyfriend Cricket lived
there with her too sometimes—but I heard them discussing their relationship once, it
wasn’t a possession thing. They were cohabiting, sharing space—and love too as
long as it felt good.
Something like
that.
But I
hadn’t met her yet as I watched her tearing up that field I went back to my teepee
and made up a pot of tea and got a fire going. The
day was drizzly. I returned to her and found out her name was Shem. I asked her if she
would like to come over to my teepee for some tea and a chance to warm up. She came over
and we fucked for an hour. It was like fucking an antelope or a mountain cat; some small
creature that had such muscles that it could jump clear up into the branches of a tree
without exertion, something with a wildness of spirit that most humans couldn’t
possibly understand. Afterwards she drank a little tea and returned to the field where she
continued to work nonstop until after dark. I would have offered to help her but she had
worn me out. I slept like a baby all the rest of that day and night.
On other days I
tried to accomplish the same maneuver again and she accepted the tea if I brought it to
her but nothing else. There were no sweet seconds from her. Truthfully I have a feeling
she hadn’t much respect for any man who couldn’t match her in energy toe to toe.
I
We sat there
under the ground and she told me about a faraway life she had once lived as a student in
an expensive university; some school like Vassar if I remember correctly. I watched her
eyes as she spoke by the light of the candle, leaning against the brown and black dirt,
plant roots growing along the walls everywhere—and I saw amazing intelligence behind
those eyes; and I heard the nuances in her voice that indicated the world of her
childhood.. In the little hole in the ground I saw her bed of blankets and books. She
whipped off her loose clothes in one motion of a tawny arm and reclined on her soft bed
and I sat on her and gave her the body massage that had brought us together. Such muscles,
such skin! What a feeling to have this woman’s feline grace in my hands!
I massaged every
muscle of her body that my fingers could reach and afterwards when I was all done I swept
my fingers slowly up her inner thighs and stopped and looked at her as she lay on her back
looking back up at me in the candlelight. I wanted to make love like we had before but I
hadn’t known her at all then—but I did know her now and now I wanted her
friendship more than anything, her trust. I didn’t want to abuse this moment by
making my play. I didn’t want to louse-up something beautiful. So I sat there looking
at her, which was almost pleasure enough in itself, she was so sensual this atavistic
Aphrodite cave goddess. After awhile she sat up beside me. I was melting in the steam of
her ancient woman smell, amplified by her hard work and lack of bathing for who knows how
long; her rich sexual smell that flooded my senses and made me wonder if she were thinking
of me in the same way I was thinking of her. She looked at me with her witchy eyes and
spoke almost musically,
“—Don’t
get any ideas...”
Then she
assembled her garments and we exited her subterranean abode. I think I used my cock for a
pogo stick all the way home.
