...what I remember is all that is left: June 17-30:
50,000 people march on Washington to support the Poor People’s Campaign. The Czechoslovakian Parliament abolishes censorship and provides for the rehabilitation of political prisoners. In Washington, Ralph Nader and seven law student volunteers form "Naders Raiders” and begin to investigate the Federal Trade Commission.
I know none of this. I don’t know anything anymore. I’m just trying to find a way to survive.
.....I need the security of a home: July
Out in the world, Johnson signs the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons. Abbie Hoffman's "The Yippies are Going to Chicago" is published in The Realist. The first Special Olympics is held at Chicago’s Soldier Field. At the Newport Folk Festival, singer Arlo Guthrie performs his 20 minute ballad "Alice's Restaurant". And Pope Paul VI issues Humanae Vitae, reaffirming the Roman Catholic Church’s opposition to artificial contraception.
But in Munich, I only thought of getting a job. And then only thought about what an awful job I had gotten.
The things I have and haven't lost: August
On August 8, Richard Nixon is nominated for president at the Republican National Convention in Miami Beach. On August 21, The Soviet Union and other Warsaw Pact nations invade Czechoslovakia to crush the "Prague Spring" liberalization drive led by Alexander Dubcek. On August 28, in Chicago, Vice-President Hubert Humphrey is nominated by the Democrats for the US Presidency . Riots break out outside the Democratic National Convention as police and anti-war demonstrators clash in the streets. And on August 31, in northeast Iran some 7-12 thousand people die in the 7.8 Dasht-e Bayaz earthquake.
And in Munich, sadly, I know all these things. I take refuge in the music that enveloped me, in the Heim, and in my relationships with Kitty and Peter.
Our way of life: September 1-15
On September 1, Iran continues to suffer aftershocks from the devastating earthquake that began August 31 and ultimately kills 15,000 people. On September 6, feminists protesting outside the Miss America pageant in Atlantic City toss cosmetics, girdles and bras into a trash can ostensibly for burning - although nothing is actually set on fire. On September 9, Arthur Ashe becomes the first black man to win the US Open men’s tennis singles championship. And on September 11, Soviet troops leave Prague for the Czechoslovakian countryside; ultimately political leaders submit to the Soviet demands.
While in Munich, I am turning 21. And, in spite of the tight, needy grip we all have on it, the Heim is slipping through our fingers, slipping away; the Heim is going to close.