Yeah. How many of us are here because our parents or grandparents stood and fought for what was right, their lives on the line? And how many because they left before the truncheon came down, the bullet found their flesh, or the bomb fell on their home?
We honour those who stood their ground. But many of us owe our existence to those who knew when to leave. Sometimes they were the same person, at different moments.
Keep your eyes open. Keep your children close. There are times to stand your ground, and times to find a safe place to call home. Knowing which is which? That’s the hard part.
Learn, live, love and thrive. Treat your fellow man the way you’d want your children to be treated.
Until the next war, resistance, or uprising moves your DNA again.
I like the opening paragraph. The older we get the more true it is. In 68 I came back from Vietnam to Long Beach CA., and the hippie movement was in full swing. Of course anyone in the military was considered sub human in those days, myself included.
Oh, what I would give to know half of what I do now back when I was 20! As you wrote in todays essay, not much has changed. The smart move, especially for us old farts, "Max Safety Mode"!
I think five years down the road we will be happy we sat on the sidelines.
I remember walking though campus in 1968 with throngs SDS (students for democratic society) with arms thrust high into air sporting black arm bands around their biceps chanting anti war slogans. In the back ground was the ever-present Joan Baez with her tag-along want-to-be activist husband on the steps of the library. She was singing anti war anthems and he disturbing anti war propaganda. I did not stop and look I just kept watching and walking thinking what a bunch of know nothing fools doing stupid stuff. I went on to my next class thinking I need my education and this is nothing more than small distraction. Has anything really changed?
I thought I knew a lot about Bill Bonner after reading him for over 30 years but he always manages to come up with something new like "a tick wondering where the old dog will go next" or the greatest wisdom of all "there are times when it is better to be somewhere else". Thank you so much for the very good humor, Bill, and for the wisdom too which you have luckily retained.
My late 60's college experiences were similar but less brutal and less foreign. I remember the burning outrage at the helplessness of watching the Troy NY police arrest a friend for his non violent insults. The burning, furious, I am inches away from doing something stupid, I will live to regret, like a bomb or something, but fortunately my instinct for survival took over and it ended there except for the permanent distrust of Government.
Observing the sinking ship from the deck is probably not a good idea...
Yeah. How many of us are here because our parents or grandparents stood and fought for what was right, their lives on the line? And how many because they left before the truncheon came down, the bullet found their flesh, or the bomb fell on their home?
We honour those who stood their ground. But many of us owe our existence to those who knew when to leave. Sometimes they were the same person, at different moments.
Keep your eyes open. Keep your children close. There are times to stand your ground, and times to find a safe place to call home. Knowing which is which? That’s the hard part.
Learn, live, love and thrive. Treat your fellow man the way you’d want your children to be treated.
Until the next war, resistance, or uprising moves your DNA again.
I like the opening paragraph. The older we get the more true it is. In 68 I came back from Vietnam to Long Beach CA., and the hippie movement was in full swing. Of course anyone in the military was considered sub human in those days, myself included.
Oh, what I would give to know half of what I do now back when I was 20! As you wrote in todays essay, not much has changed. The smart move, especially for us old farts, "Max Safety Mode"!
I think five years down the road we will be happy we sat on the sidelines.
Jim Marshall
I remember walking though campus in 1968 with throngs SDS (students for democratic society) with arms thrust high into air sporting black arm bands around their biceps chanting anti war slogans. In the back ground was the ever-present Joan Baez with her tag-along want-to-be activist husband on the steps of the library. She was singing anti war anthems and he disturbing anti war propaganda. I did not stop and look I just kept watching and walking thinking what a bunch of know nothing fools doing stupid stuff. I went on to my next class thinking I need my education and this is nothing more than small distraction. Has anything really changed?
Bill, thanks for the humor - how long were you in France?
Great story with several meaningful lessons! Do you have your bolt hole?!?
He has several. Where do you think he spent the Plandemic?
“Happy is the man who finds wisdom, and the man who gains understanding.” Proverbs 3:13
I thought I knew a lot about Bill Bonner after reading him for over 30 years but he always manages to come up with something new like "a tick wondering where the old dog will go next" or the greatest wisdom of all "there are times when it is better to be somewhere else". Thank you so much for the very good humor, Bill, and for the wisdom too which you have luckily retained.
My late 60's college experiences were similar but less brutal and less foreign. I remember the burning outrage at the helplessness of watching the Troy NY police arrest a friend for his non violent insults. The burning, furious, I am inches away from doing something stupid, I will live to regret, like a bomb or something, but fortunately my instinct for survival took over and it ended there except for the permanent distrust of Government.