In late Fall 1975, the Sycamore house-church, a composite of highly unlikely people got together to share meals, thoughts and good works. Special guest in attendance: me. They chipped in, some donated winter clothes, others a rim of song sheets (Peter, Paul and Mary’s “Puff the Magic Dragon” …) or a book (Markings). After that potluck dinner, at the home of then leader, Professor Rusty Roy of Material Research Lab at Penn State, we sat around in circle to “share”. The book was Small is Beautiful. And it’s about ecology and economy, consumption and costs. By the time it’s my turn, after professor Gerhard’s turn, I asked for the guitar.
I chipped in (never skip a turn or a beat) by singing. It was a Carpenters’ number: “Sing”….and you should have seen the faces of people, surprised yet , joined in as if this sort of impromptu and unpredictable happened every month; secretary from the Lab, wife of Head of Research Lab (later heading the Lab herself, in her own rights), hubby that came along for the meeting, Weis’ Groceries store owner & wife (Kate) and Rusty’s hippie sons.
Everybody sang, “La la la la, la la la la la la”…”to last your whole life long”…. Contagious. Now in looking back, I know – I was quite “off”, Sabrina-like, (State-College cultural sub-text and nuance was calling for a high-level abstract discussion to groundswell and create next-level social-construct and academic cohesion within the “same app class”; not for low-brow ad-supported radio pop music which I happened to enjoy when first arrived – given my background which I had to skip siesta (in Saigon) for soft-rock Music program- whose anthem was Your Song, by Elton John.
Now looking back 46 years on, I can’t help but smiling.
Many in that circle perhaps have passed on. The book I still struggle to make sense of (Markings). And the song, long forgotten. But “Sing” I did. And they did. We existed at one point in the span of billions of light years.
I existed. My nation also did but did not survive. At least the regime that was.
Even America, first Christmas ever in 2 decades, is not involved in a war.
That Christmas was also a first, in a long drawn out stalemate, of then longest America’s war ended in a half-note, de-fizzled, leaving many lives in the balance.
Ours.
Can you imagine an Afghan refugee today, sitting among the intellectuals of the day, waiting to receive warm clothes, yet entertains the host with host-country top hit? Napalm girl comes home.
Country Road takes me home.
Sister Golden Hair. Born to run.
Get together “come on, people now, smile on your brother everybody get together”
Put your hand in the hand of the man who stills the waters….
Then, it’s “puff, the magic dragon, lives by the seas”….
Chord by chord, I plunged into my new American life, campus life and dangerous life. Confronting each challenge heads-on: remedial English class, driving class, typing class, conversant session, Sunday school, after school, physical education, work study, homework, assigned reading, lab at the only Computer lab on campus etc…
Never feel certain or safe. Around the corner, might lie a homeless guy who won’t leave me alone. Around the corner, might be someone who is contagious (asymptomatic). Around the corner, might be a guy who wears a red hat, although waving at passer-by, but at any given moment, might park his RV in front of my old company’s Phone Exchange (routing box) to suicide-bomb.
The war, mine, might have been over. But at the heart of man, warring is forever, as old as the Earth itself.
People can’t live in peace with other people. People might share a meal, but not a mind. Or else, we wouldn’t have weapon labs and war department AKA Department of Defence.
Human nature. Hard to cure. Hard to solve. But once, there were the times, when a refugee boy from a faraway land, sitting amidst a circle of intellectuals of the day, asking for a guitar, tuned it up and started singing “sing, sing a song….sing out loud sing out strong….to last our whole life long”….Glad the Saudi are joining us in the chorus of global harmony….Welcome to Soundstorms, in the desert, on the mountain top….I hear the Coca Cola commercial “I like to teach the world to sing, in perfect harmony.”
We are the children….We are the world. Born to run. Born to be wild. Born to sing, to soar, and to be free. Can’t erase that TIME photo of the year (2021), a Hispanic wife, on the other side of the ICU partitioned glass shrieked out “Fly high” to her dying husband. Fly high, be free at last….Bye to all the dignitaries of 2021: Desmond Tutu, Didion, Dole and Powell. May you R.I.P. Grateful for your exemplary lives and all the high bars and high notes.
Thang Nguyen 555 