“Reach Out of the Darkness” — As Timely Now as it was Then

When David and I take walks or just relax on the front porch, we listen to Pandora on my phone. We almost always listen to the Roy Orbison or Gordon Lightfoot channels. Recently we heard the song “Reach Out of the Darkness” by the folk duo Friend and Lover — their one big hit released in 1967.

Since I was a child of the ’60s, that song and its lyrics brought back a slew of memories from that period. We were that idealistic generation with messages to save the world — messages of peace, love and protest, urging each other to “teach your parents well.” There were a couple of verses I especially loved:

I knew a man that I did not care for
And then one day, this man gave me a call
We sat and talked about things on our mind
And now this man, he is a friend of mine

Reach out in the darkness
Reach out in the darkness
Reach out in the darkness
And you may find a friend ...

Don’t be afraid of love
Don’t be afraid, don’t be afraid to love
Listen to me
Everybody needs a little love
Everybody needs somebody
That they can be thinking of ...

I think it’s so groovy now
That people are finally getting together ...

Reach out in the darkness ...

In the third book of my trilogy concerning the nature of being human, from our genes to our ultimate destiny — The Fiction of Our Lives: Creating Our Stories Over a Lifetime (Cascade Books, 2016), I discussed at some length our music of the Protest Generation. So if you will permit me to quote myself (I give myself permission!), here goes:

The protest songs of the ’60s and ’70s were educational in the way Dan Levitin meant in his The World in Six Songs. Songs such as Arlo Guthrie’s “Alice’s Restaurant” (where Guthrie sings about being arrested for littering but then being found highly acceptable by the local draft board in order to “kill, kill”), Joan Baez’s rendition of “We Shall Overcome,” and Peter, Paul, and Mary’s “Blowin’ in the Wind” (see lead photo and photos below as examples) — all convey pointed protest aimed at war and racism. ... Political movements fueled by such songs are a form of social bonding, stimulating and motivating the participants to action. (p. 77)

... but under it all ... lay a quest for communitas, for some utopian ideal of authentic community where free individuals would bond into a brother- and sisterhood of human family, where peace and love would reign for all. “Attending a free concert ... or listening to a psychedelic rock record ... seemed like a gateway to a new utopia — all you had to do was join in; if everyone did, then global social transformation would surely follow. ... This was a powerful quality of rock (but) the music also became a means of critically confronting the present.”

Which brings me — fortunately or unfortunately — to today. We are a divided nation, not for the first time but in our time. Where we “other” the other and view the other Party as enemy. The countercultural movement of the ’60s was not just about sex, drugs, and rock-and-roll. Not just some utopian time where “you had to be there, man!” But it offers a history of how struggles over culture and what it means to be a citizen affected our behavior and beliefs. That history does hold lessons for us today as we stare across our divide and try to heal our union. As one writer puts it, “the need remains to invent modes of citizenship suitable for the difficult conditions of more recent times.”

And so here we are, right in the midst of those “difficult times.” So “reach out in the darkness” and you just might find that one of those “others” turns out to be a friend!

Well, here’s hoping!