Young Hippies

After a long day of doing nothing (those are the longest days of course), I settled into bed rather late; about 7:30pm. I had one elbow down, and was about to ease the other half of my body onto the bed, when a car pulled up and parked at the bus stop/u-turn point across the road. The car was there when I fell asleep and it was there in the morning when I went to town. A red Jeep Cherokee. Newer than mine, and from New York. Lic# EJL1303. Duly noted.
Returning from town they were still there, but this time there were people moving around the Jeep. I parked and entered the house. Heated coffee, and went upstairs to view the squatters from behind the mirrors. I was on my first cup of coffee when they approached the shack; a tall woman, not heavy, but not thin either with long, dark, red hair and a child hanging from a wide band of cloth slung around her neck and over her shoulder: a kind of circular hammock the child hung in. The child, a cute little red headed baby girl that was eight months old I would later find out, was adept at holding on to that cloth as a young chimp. A man, at least ten feet behind the woman, with a full beard and wearing a cap with ear muffs he had pulled over his ears, was carrying a small bag with paper handles that, when he got closer, I could see contained four one pound packages of butter and some mushrooms in a cardbord package under cellophane.
I said,"Good morning. What can I do for you folks today?"
The woman smiled and said,"We were looking for a barter."
I smiled and replied that there wasn't a thing in the world that I needed except 380 rounds for my Sig Sauer and shotgun shells (I had planned on driving to Grants Pass and buying both, along with a case of clay pigeons, before they had appeared on my doorstep). Then I asked what they had to trade, and what they wanted.
The woman smiled and said, "How about some coffee? We have butter and mushrooms."
I considered her request. Hot coffee, after sleeping in a car, probably sounded wonderful to her.
It was a moment of decision. I had no interest in bartering, but I thought I would hear their story and invited them in for coffee. The flip side of the decision was to send them down the road. The baby was the deciding factor. I brought them into the warmth and shelter of the stove room in the shack. I sat them down, served them coffee, asked their names, and then asked how they came to sleep in the Jeep across the road (I couldn't help the touch of Seuss).
Their story was a 'friend' had told them that Happy Camp was an old hippie settlement where, if they just went and hung out, they would be invited into a commune or a community, or find their dreams of nirvana or something... and so they were on their way to Happy Camp.
Happy Camp Road starts one mile down the road from my house at what is locally called 'four corners'; a crossing of Takilma Road where Happy Camp Road becomes Waldo Road. I live one mile up from four corners. Happy Camp is thirty seven miles farther south across the border, in California. I know the sign at four corners reads 'Road Open', but as this young couple found out, the road is only plowed to the snow park which is just eleven miles past my house. The road is impassable during the winter months. That was how they came to be sleeping across the street.
I asked where they got the butter. Neither answered
I asked how they came to be in Oregon via New York. Several times the young man got lost in his dialogue descibing the trials and tribulations of being young and aimless and wanting more, without opportunity. At times he made no sense in his words. The two of them had been together since New Year's Eve. She had escaped a musician that hit her, and he a woman now in a cult, who wouldn't have sex for purposes other than propagation of the species. Somewhere there had been a settlement, and he had bought a Jeep, and they had been on their way to her mother's in eastern Washington before Happy Camp had come up...
I tried to steer them right; I explained that Happy Camp was a defunct logging town, heavily influenced by the Indian Reservation where (my impression was) people were neither friendly nor open, and usually didn't like strangers. I went further though and described Takilma. The small community on the south side of Hope Mountain, on the opposite side of the ridge from me. Takilma, an old hippie settlement with an alternative lifestyle community where (if there was a place in this area) these psuedo-hippies would be welcome. It's only a mile and a half from me and I explained twice how to get there. I told them of the community school where they might get help.
They made no move to leave. They were comfortable. I looked at both of them. I knew they were scared to death. Finding our way in the world can be terrifying. My heart went out to them. Maybe they needed to learn about 'work'. I knew they would have been happy to move right in. I stood and escorted them out. As the mother held the doorjam, and lowered her foot down the long step from my doorway to the ground, I noticed the baby under her arm; the baby's legs around the mothers back, still holding to that circular cloth for dear life. The baby understood. I had the feeling she was already learning to take care of herself.
I wanted to rescue them. I hope they rescue themselves. I remember it was not that long ago I had to rescue myself.
It only takes yourself, most of the time.