I grew up in sunny California, but my family always celebrated Thanksgiving as though we were living in the snow-covered peaks of Vermont.
I was greatly encouraged and deeply inspired in 2017 after having read a musical message from Peter Yarrow of Peter, Paul, and Mary fame, announcing on HuffPost that the folk song protest of days gone by is anything but muted. As a matter of fact, it’s very much alive.
Joanie and I talk to each other at least once a year, and that is always on August 12, the day both of us were born in the year 1946, not long after WWII ended, when every husband, who, if he wasn’t a father already, returned from the battlefield with a strong desire to start a family. My dad was in the Navy in the South Pacific; her dad was with the Navy in Europe.
Boy did I miss a lot of big news while I was away in Vietnam. Fifty years ago this summer, I left the good old USA for a year-long commitment in Saigon. I wouldn’t return to the World (a G.I. reference to the states) for 365 days, provided of course that I lived through the entire experience.