Summer of 69 - Taking Me Back

**Ruby Tuesday is at my photoblog: Carletta's Captures.**

A good friend and I exchange music and photos on weekends. It's a chance to keep in touch. I found a YouTube video in my inbox of Bryan Adams Summer of 69.

'Back in the summer of '69

Man we were killin' time

We were young and restless

We needed to unwind

I guess nothin' can last forever -'

Well that took me back and I got to thinking what that summer was like for me.

That's me over there at the left. What's that in my hand -yep, a camera. That's a Polaroid Model 20 "Swinger." The Swinger featured an extinction exposure meter tied to the aperture which displayed the word "YES" in a window below the viewfinder when the exposure was set correctly. Earlier models also displayed the word "NO" when not properly adjusted, while later units used only the YES indicator. The Swinger also included a built-in flashgun for AG-1 flashbulbs. I was taking a picture of my best friend. My Mom was taking my picture - probably with her Brownie camera. We would stop to pick up my girlfriend on the way to church. Most likely I would have been driving that day. My Mom usually let me drive to church and back on Sundays. It wasn't like nowadays when it seems all teenagers have cars. It was a treat for me to be able to drive. I'm pretty sure that summer I didn't get the car by myself though. It would be a couple more summers before I was allowed to cruise downtown. If I'd had my own car it would have been a VW like the one there behind me. I wanted a yellow one with daisy stickers all over it. I know; but it was the hippie years and I yearned to be part of the counterculture of the times. Plus I had a crush on a boy with long hair who played the drums and had a gorgeous smile.

If my telling you I wanted to be a hippie isn't enough to convince you and you need proof of my yearning just check out the headband in my hair and my unflattering dotted swiss smocked dress - definitely a wanna-be flower girl from the spring of 69!

I'd like to say I went to Woodstock but that didn't happen until a few years ago and just by chance a trip to New York took me by the town of Bethel. There were no bands, no rain, no mud - just a small statue to memoralize the event and the chance to say I'd gone to Woodstock.

This photo to the right is another indication of the hippie influence wouldn't you say. I mean look at that ruffled shirt. The jumper was a maroon color and believe it or not I made that myself. It was a 4-H sewing project. Do I sew now? Heaven forbid - NO! Actually I hate sewing and I'm not sure I liked it then.

Even though I was growing up as it were I remember that summer filled with play - catching fireflies with my cousins and playing hide and seek at night. A game of hide and seek put that big gash on my leg one night. I was running to get to base so I wouldn't have to be 'it.'

Ran right into the corner of those steps and took the skin on my leg down to the bone. I have the scar to prove it.

'And now the times are changin'

Look at everything that's come and gone'

Nothing can last forever but looking back to the summer of 69 standing there on my Mama's front porch I guess I probably thought it would.