Everyone was enjoying their new found sexual freedom. It was a time of Free Love. It was fun and they were all having a ball! But at a certain point around their mid-twenties, clocks began ticking, and the women wanted children. They didn’t care who the father was. It was just time to reproduce.
There were a lot of Hippie Mamas congregating in college towns, banding together as age groups tend to do in any culture. They were all in their twenties, going to college, and they all had kids under the age of five. They had been raised in the middle class and had middle class values in spite of their sexual rebellion. They were all trying to make themselves better.
They were the single moms of the 60’s and 70’s who didn’t care if they had husbands or not. It was the culture war. They were fighting for freedom and change on every front. From their hair, to their bras, to their sexual and reproductive practices, they were rebels carving out new land – redefining cultural mores.
The Hippie Mamas were determined to mix things up, so they dated non-traditional partners as part of the revolution. Many women experimented by dating outside their norm as far as mates went. There was a huge mix of cross cultural dating. They were spreading the gene pool around. Black, white, Native American, Hispanic, and Asian permutations… and the mixed kids were beautiful!
They built a support network in order to survive. They had child care co-ops where women traded childcare with each other in order to have some party time with their URAM (unrelated adult male) as the welfare department called their various boyfriends.
They developed community gardens and food co-ops where they could get fresh vegetables and nutritional food for their families. Even their eating habits changed as they turned from traditional meat based meals to vegetarian cooking.
They lived on AFDC and any grants or loans they could get to further their education. They often got no support from their families or former “Baby Daddies.” They got food stamps and WIC coupons, free lunches for the kids, and free daycare with the requirement of weekly parent participation.
The women ended up with degrees and careers. The fact that many of these women were middle class girls who dropped out and rebelled against the system in the Culture War had an interesting outcome. They paid their loans off and went to work at jobs where they paid taxes, and became middle class. What a surprise!… and the beat goes on.
(First published 12/19/11)
