When the power of love overcomes the love of power, the world will know peace.
(Jimi Hendrix 1942-1970)
R had been drafted and was in Newport News, Virginia, training to be an Army helicopter mechanic in August 1969. We were 19 years old. He and a few of his army buddies considered going to Woodstock for the weekend.
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On Saturday of this Memorial Day weekend, I was talking with a friend on my cell phone while looking out my windows toward Scudder Pond. I noticed a small flock of birds in one of the rapidly increasing number of alder saplings that are growing up amidst the cattails in Scudder Pond. I'm glad the flock lingered for a while because gradually I realized that they weren't the usual birds I see from my window. While listening to my friend, I found my binoculars and was rewarded with an intimate view of Cedar waxwings. Soon after that, they all flew away. I haven't seen them since. I know that R would have loved seeing them. So many times in the years before and after he died, I have seen something that I know he would love to see. It's been years since I've seen a Cedar waxwing from my porch, much less a flock.
Is it a coincidence that the flock appeared on the first day of Memorial Day weekend? I don't think so.
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Sending love to Everyone today. Fragment of a letter from R while he was in Vietnam in 1970:
