The PIer, 1968

 

view of the Naples Pier, 1968

The Naples pier in the Summer of 1968—the time and place of my novel ‘One Summer in the Sun.’ My characters would have been bicycling right along these streets. Maybe if we look closely we’ll see one! Okay, maybe not. In theory, the fictional Sumerlin house where the kids spend so much time would be a bit off the right-hand side of the picture. Unfortunately, the celebrated pier banyan tree does not show here, but it is one the street that ends at the pier.

Hippies

By the time my two ‘Women in the Sun’ novels* are set, 1968 and the beginning of 1969, hippies were part of the culture. I have had characters use the term—mostly older characters and in a derogatory sense, admittedly. But true hippies, true young counter-cultural sorts, were exceedingly rare in a rather conservative southern town like Naples.

This, of course, didn’t keep the clothes from showing up! Fashion goes everywhere and television helped spread it more quickly than ever. Hair grew longer. Flared jeans replaced narrow-legged ‘mod’ trousers. Paisleys and flowers appeared on shirts, and both sexes took to wearing beads.

Do any of my characters embrace the hippie lifestyle? Not really and not yet; things may and probably will change if I continue the story of my ‘triumvirate’ of young women. They are not quite the hippie generation, in truth. Older brothers and sisters who had moved on to other places would have been more likely to adopt the hippie culture. By the time of my tales, the world was already leaving the Sensational Sixties behind and slipping toward the Cynical Seventies.

Peace and love and optimism were becoming the casualties of the changing times. Nixon had been elected president in the USA. Things seemed grimmer than they had a year or two before, during the ‘Summer of Love,’ during the height of the counter-culture. The ’68 riots at the Democratic convention Chicago pointed the direction things were going.

And in ’69, Woodstock shared the summer with the Manson murders, while the war in Vietnam ground on. But hippie culture lingered on, lingered at least through the first half of the Seventies, though not with the vigor and freshness of the previous decade.

Will any of my characters become, in any sense, hippies? I think we can see that James embraced some of what was going on. He was the one who traveled, who got away from the narrower world the others inhabit. It is just possible he will be the one to ‘drop out.’ Or not! We shall simply have to wait and see what happens to him and his friends.

Birth Control

Pregnancy did not come up in “One Summer in the Sun” nor in the sequel. It just might in the next book, if I write it someday. Not any of our ‘triumvirate,’ to be sure, but perhaps an acquaintance. I have ideas for this (it would probably not be Paulette, the black friend introduced in "One Christmas in the Sun;” that comes off cliched).

Birth control was not so simple a matter in 1968. It was not always easy for an unmarried woman to have access to ‘the pill.’ I mentioned in ‘Summer’ that Kris’s mother had made sure she would, and Kris (undoubtedly with Mom’s input) helped Ronnie when she asked for advice. That was fortunate, as Ronnie ‘lost’ her virginity (is that like misplacing it?) in the course of the story.

Joey remains a virgin—and a Catholic—but we can be sure she has given the question its due consideration. After all, she is going to have sex eventually. I’m not going to keep her from it forever!

Be all that as it may, pregnancy and birth control were important factors in life then, just as important as Vietnam and the draft, or racism. The ‘sexual revolution’ had arrived and I am certainly not going to ignore it. But one can fit only so much in one book (and have it remain readable).

Guitars

There is a certain amount of guitar playing in the pages of ‘One Summer in the Sun.’ Only one of my three main protagonists is a player, and she only fools about with an inexpensive instrument from Sears until she becomes involved with Alan. Her father plays too, being a folk music enthusiast, and keeps his prized Martin classical guitar tucked away under the bed. Yes, like Willie Nelson plays, but in those days the ‘name’ players were guys like Burl Ives and Marty Robbins.

Alan owns a Gibson Hummingbird and has bluegrass tendencies. The precision of that style of playing appeals to him. Of course, he flat-picks the instrument and is pretty proficient at it, though not inclined to show off. When chided about his taste in guitars by James ‘Jam’ Summerlin, he responds that Keith Richards claims it is the perfect acoustic for rock and roll.

Jam’s twin sister, Angelica aka ‘Jelly,’ is a musical prodigy, a player of the classical guitar. I did not specify a particular maker, only that it was a high end Spanish instrument. Her parents can afford it. And they could certainly afford to buy Jam a good guitar too, though he is less serious (although talented) about playing. I gave him a Gibson F-25, their ‘Folksinger’ model from the Sixties. He hadn’t pulled it out of the closet and played in a couple years, but being among players during summer vacation led him to renew his acquaintance with the guitar.

 

a Gibson F-25

By the way, the one in the included picture is set up for metal strings (slanted bridge) but it’s essentially the same instrument as the nylon stringed guitar Jam plays.

So why did I make some of my characters guitar players? It was certainly a way of letting them bond; they are rather different people otherwise. Then too, I know a little about guitars and music. Mostly, the guitars just seemed a fitting symbol of that time, the summer of 1968, and my slightly naive, innocent bunch of kids

POVs Two

This is how I kept track of chapters, dates, and points of view in One Summer in the Sun:

CHAPTERS and TIMELINE

before: June 4 — graduation and Hurricane Abby

JUNE

1 : Kris — June 7, Friday morning

2 : Ronnie — June 7, Friday evening

3 : Kris — June 7, Friday evening

4 : Joey — June 8, Saturday morning

5 : Ronnie — June 8, Saturday afternoon

6 : Joey — June 9, Sunday morning

7 : Kris — June 9, Sunday evening

8 : Ronnie — June 10, Monday evening/night

9 : Joey — June 10, Monday night

10 : Kris — June 11, Tuesday afternoon

11 : Joey — June 14, Friday morning

12 : Ronnie — June 15, Saturday morning

13 : Kris — June 15, Saturday evening

14 : Ronnie — June 15, Saturday night

15 : Kris — June 15, Saturday night

16 : Joey — June 16, Sunday morning

17 : Ronnie — June 17, Monday evening and June 18 Tuesday

18 : Kris — June 21, Friday morning

19 : Ronnie — June 21, Friday evening

20 : Joey — June 22, Saturday morning

21 : Kris — June 22, Saturday

22 : Joey — June 23, Sunday morning

23 : Ronnie — June 25, Tuesday morning

24 : Kris — June 28, Friday morning

25 : Joey — June 29, Saturday morning

26 : Ronnie — June 30, Sunday early morning

27 : Kris — June 30, Sunday late morning

JULY

28 : Ronnie — July 2, Tuesday morning

29 : Joey — July 4, Thursday afternoon

30 : Kris — July 4, Thursday night

31 : Joey — July 5, Friday afternoon

32 : Ronnie — July 6, Saturday morning

33 : Kris — July 8, Monday morning

34 : Ronnie — July 12, Friday afternoon

35 : Joey — July 14, Sunday morning

36 : Kris — July 14, Sunday afternoon

37 : Ronnie — July 16, Tuesday evening

38 : Joey — July 17, Wednesday early

39 : Ronnie — July 17, Wednesday morning

40 : Kris — July 17, Wednesday night

41 : Joey — July 18, Thursday afternoon

42 : Kris — July 19, Friday morning

43 : Ronnie — July 21, Sunday afternoon

44 : Joey — July 22, Monday very early

45 : Ronnie — July 23, Tuesday morning

46 : Kris — July 24, Wednesday evening

47 : Joey — July 27, Saturday morning

48 : Ronnie — July 27, Saturday afternoon

49 : Kris — July 27, Saturday evening

50 : Joey — July 31, Wednesday morning

AUGUST

51 : Kris — August 2, Friday evening

52 : Ronnie — August 3, Saturday afternoon

53 : Joey — August 7, Wednesday morning

54 : Kris — August 7, Wednesday afternoon

55 : Ronnie — August 7, Wednesday evening

56 : Joey — August 7, Wednesday night

57 : Ronnie — August 8, Thursday morning

58 : Kris — August 8, Thursday afternoon

59 : Ronnie — August 10, Saturday afternoon

60 : Joey — August 11, Sunday morning

61 : Ronnie — August 11, Sunday afternoon

62 : Kris — August 11, Sunday evening

63 : Ronnie — August 13, Tuesday morning

64 : Joey — August 14, Wednesday morning

65 : Ronnie — August 15, Thursday afternoon

66 : Kris — August 16, Friday evening

67 : Joey — August 19, Monday afternoon

68 : Ronnie — August 23, Friday afternoon

69 : Joey — August 23, Friday evening

70 : Kris — August 24, Saturday morning

71 : Joey — August 29, morning

SEPTEMBER

epilogue : Ronnie — September 2, night

All this, of course, in the summer of 1968.