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Some time ago, I was in a class called "Magazine Writing" (I think that's what it was called).

The whole deal was if the shit you wrote was good they'd post it to the Web site, called "Cyberhemia." I'm posting the link because some friends of I Hate... are featured, so you can browse if you'd like.

Two of my essays are up there:

One is on YouTube, and how videos are getting small and grainy, and if there is a possibility of art in such a medium. The theme of the course was "arts and entertainment," which I wasn't thrilled about, but I did my best all things considered.

Another one was on Heath Ledger's death, and the reaction to it. I'm pretty sure I was way off the topic the professor wanted me to write about. But, whatever, I think it stands on its own.

The real reason for this post is that for the final essay we were supposed to "immerse" ourselves in a given topic and write a heavily researched piece on it. I was lucky enough to have gotten the Monterey Pop Festival. I think my professor was a bit of a Hippie back in the day, or at least he's a big liberal.

Anyway I wrote the damn thing in the library and e-mailed it in. I was tired and grumpy and confused and just generally having one of those days. But I thought what I wrote was pretty good: funny, interesting, personal. But I never had a copy on my computer. And the professor never graded me on it or gave me any feedback. I did get an A in the class, though. But the essay I turned in was so downright crazy I wanted to see what he had to say.

OK so, way too much intro, but I thought the stage had to be set. I found the essay going through my e-mail's "Sent mail" folder (for a completely unrelated reason). So I thought I'd post it here for your enjoyment. Read it, if you'd like, and post a comment, please. I've made only two minor edits.

Jimi Lit the Guitar on Fire, By the Way

I suppose it could be simple enough. Tell the story of the Monterey International Pop Festival, the three-day 1967 event in San Francisco that introduced future legends like Jimi Hendrix and The Who to widespread American audiences. More than 200,000 people attended the Festival in Monterey, Calif., less than 100 miles down the coast from San Francisco, the Hippie capital of the world. But my concern is that all research and immersion aside, I will still not be able to beat the Festival’s Wikipedia page for tone and accuracy. If I take a straightforward approach, give the who, what, where and why of the event as it has been told in the media, what good will that possibly bring? So indulge me, as I write about the drug-infused “Summer of Love,” because I’m going to take a trip of my own.

How can I tell this story better than someone who was there, at the Festival, or at least alive during that time and can testify to the general air that hung over the country? Because in order to fully understand the Monterey Festival, and its importance, you have to consider the Sixties, the Hippies, the Vietnam War and what they all mean in the 21st century.

I know what I think about those things I’ve just listed. I know what most of the media thinks – they’re of that generation and look back upon the free love age with nostalgia and fondness afforded to them by their cushy jobs and pension plans. But what about Americans at large and American culture? As the Baby Boomers start to retire and their ability to shape the conventional narrative expires, what legacy will they have left?

“Monterey – a celebration of youthful naiveté,” writes Grace Slick, of Jefferson Airplane, one of the headline acts in the Festival. “A last desperate whoop of careless freedom,” before the Draft took the men off to Vietnam, writes Glenys Roberts, an attendee, 40 years later in the (UK) Daily Mail. She credits Janis Joplin as the high point. But by 1970, Janis Joplin was dead. So were Jimi Hendrix and Otis Redding, a soul legend. I’ve never known the hope of the Sixties without knowing that, yeah, drugs are probably bad for you, that people died, that the extreme nature of the era probably led to Nixon, Jimmy Carter and, worst yet, the Reagan Conservative Revolution.

So let’s get the established facts out of the way. The music was undoubtedly incredible. I love listening to the rock from this era. Turbulent times lead to great art. Oddly, the media was much more critical of the music when it came out than they are now. And while some like to set up Monterey as the precursor to Woodstock, or a more pure version untainted by mainstream acceptance, the music for both events was essentially the same. Craig McGregor writes in the Times: “The cruelest paradox of the Woodstock nation is that it has been liberated, primarily, by the black race from which it has borrowed its music, dance, language, style and much of its sense of brotherhood – but that so far it has done little to free those who freed it.” Grace Slick would blame others: “For a couple of years in the late sixties, no matter what was going on in the world, our generation happily assumed that with love and education we could change outdated social systems. One huge thing that we missed, 90% of the population is genetically imbued with sub mediocre reasoning skills. No matter how much you hug them or read to them, there’s no correcting stupid.”

Monterey lives on, most likely, because it was recorded and turned into a documentary by director D.A. Pennebaker. It’s sort-of a cool thing to know about when you’re high and talking about great music. “Yea, man,” one might say, “That’s where Hendrix and The Who and Janis Joplin came to America.” Then you'll look up Jefferson Airplane’s White Rabbit on YouTube and maybe type in “Hendrix Monterey” and call up his performance.

Roberts writes that the Festival “celebrated a genuine new pacifist streak among the young which gathered such momentum that, eight years later, it led to the end of the Vietnam War.” Eight years? Is she really proud of that? Nixon ended the war; do you think he was a crowning achievement of the flower-power movement? She is quick to hedge her fascination with the event – crowing about the dangers of psychedelic drugs as she giddily recalls Timothy Leary telling kids to “turn on, tune in and drop out.” The same crowd that tells me on a near daily basis to apply for internships and work my rear end off so I can get a good job looks back upon their lazy, drug-filled youth with such reverence that the hypocrisy is palpable. We’ve had the fun, they say, we’ve had the craziness, now settle into your pre-packaged, mainstream Main Street existence. And then these same people wonder why we want to hang around the house until we’re 26, or 29, or even later. We’ve largely missed out on the youthful naiveté that you rub in our faces with your superior music and revolution – even one that largely failed.

The supposed “counterculture” that the Hippies thrust upon America is treated with such reverence by the media that I have to be a little suspicious. It seems the Boomers have been writing the rules for a long time now. Newsweek said it best, when it marked the 40th anniversary of the Summer of Love: “The fact is, we're paying a lot more attention to those long-ago months now than we did back then, when they were actually happening… The boomer nostalgia machinery has been running full tilt.” The article goes on to say that it’s difficult to impose coherence on an inherently unruly time. I, for one, am still quite confused how to process it all. And in the meantime, I’ll have my own youthful college rebellion.

I’m rambling now. I haven’t had much sleep. I procrastinated, but I always do that. This may not make much sense. I may not get the grade I want. I know I’m not supposed to discuss grades in a paper, I don’t think, but this is going to be graded, so why not address it? I’ve used too many questions. But that’s all I can come up with. I know I could have done this straightforward, quoted the thirty or so articles I’ve read, and done a good job. But it would have been something that someone else could have done much better. I can only make this unique if I give my own perspective. I’ve been up all night. I had to work late. I couldn’t sleep. I think I’m addicted to the Food Network. I think I’ll have a nap now.

-Steve Yusko, 5/7/2008

UPDATE: In case this isn't abundantly clear, I think the professor for this class thought I was an ass-hole. And he was probably right.