take it easy, man

This past weekend, my family took an afternoon drive up to Woodstock, New York to grab some lunch and take in the sights.  While the town seems sleepier now than I imagine it was back in its hippie heyday, it has still retained bits and pieces of its storied past.  One can still spot a few stragglers, living relics from that golden era of peace and love. The hippies there today look like the ones from faded photographs commemorating the '69 concert only, well, faded: greasy gray hair tied back in a ponytail, Tie-Dye T-shirts, Birkenstocks with socks (stereotypes do carry some truth). Although I had been to Woodstock before, this was the first time I had visited since my eco-conversion, and I observed the town through green-tinted lenses.  Watching some of these burnt-out love children peddling their hippie paraphernalia raised a recurring thought.  When did hippie become synonymous with environmentalist?

I just don't see it.  A free association with the word "hippie" brings to mind many things, perhaps peace signs, promiscuity, or pot.  How many environmentalists do you know who a) make sand candles and distribute them as Christmas gifts , b) teach their dogs how to catch a frisbee, or c) milk goats?  Exactly. 

If there is one thing I would agree upon as a common connection between the hippies of the '60s and 21st century environmentalists, it would be their penchant for idealism in the face of the most bleak situations.  For example, as the Vietnam War dragged on hippies tenaciously clung to their belief in the power of protest to end the war.  I would say that a comparable parallel would be the continuing efforts of environmentalists to change the world in the face of a growing natural crisis, even when no one seems to care.  

Maybe CSNY was on to something I can't get.  From "Woodstock": "And we got to get ourselves back to the garden."