Voluntary Peasants Prologue: Enlightenment What's It Good For

By Melvyn Stiriss

Soon To Be a TV Series
Voluntary Peasants/Life Inside the Ultimate American Commune: The Farm, is bursting with true, far-out sixties stories—cool adventures, good vibes, warmth, humor. Entertaining and uplifting. The psychedelic sixties come alive in this multi-level history/memoir, written by a journalist who dropped out to live the story of the times and seek enlightenment.

An extraordinary journey from Greenwich Village beatniks in the ‘50s into the psychedelic ‘60s and ‘70s—heady, revolutionary times—times rich in lessons that can possibly help us now.

This book, Prologue to Voluntary Peasants, is the author’s back story entitled: Enlightenment What’s It Good For.

Melvyn was born in New York City, raised in Edgewater, New Jersey, attended the University of Richmond, was a newspaper and UPI wire service reporter and editor. These are his far-out adventures coming of age, going with the flow—riding a powerful wave of energy that raised consciousness and shattered conventional paradigms around the world.

After attending Woodstock, Melvyn followed the energy to San Francisco, sampled the spiritual smorgasbord of swamis, yogis, gurus and chose to follow hippie “self-realized spiritual teacher” Stephen Gaskin on a round-the-country, 100-colorful hippie bus caravan. Hop on a fun hippie bus and journey to Tennessee to begin a new life and a new lifestyle, a lifestyle the world can afford.

Voluntary Peasants conveys sixties energy, vibes, mindscape and philosophy. Beyond sex, drugs and rock ‘n roll—beyond hippies, true tales of a remarkable experiment in collective living as thousands of high-minded people join forces, pool resources and attempt to create a gracious, meaningful, sustainable lifestyle the world can afford.

Leave the ordinary. Let your head soar free and take a trip—an extraordinary journey from Greenwich Village in the ‘50s through the psychedelic ‘60s and ‘70s—high adventures, true tales channeling heady, revolutionary times, providing some insight to today’s times.

Voluntary Peasants is available as a 422-page paperback with 40 photos only at www.voluntarypeasants.com. Voluntary Peasants will soon be available as an audiobook.
Includes the author’s backstory: Enlightenment/What’s It Good For
Voluntary Peasants is also available as an Audiobook at Amazon’s Audible.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Melvyn Stiriss
• Release date: Aug 21, 2020
• ISBN: 9781005268275

Melvyn Stiriss

Storyteller, humorist, artist, musician, naturalist, back porch philosopher—Melvyn Stiriss was born in New York City in 1942, raised in Edgewater, New Jersey and attended the University of Richmond. Melvyn worked as a newspaper reporter in New Jersey and as a reporter, editor, and announcer for United Press International wire service in New York and Chicago.Melvyn worked a stint as a Madison Avenue publicist, a “Mad Man,” went to Woodstock, “dropped out” and followed “the powerful mysterious energy of the time”—over the edge, out of the box and into the heart of the cultural revolution—San Francisco,” where the young seeker found a weed-smoking “psychedelic Zen guru,” Stephen Gaskin. Melvyn joined Gaskin’s cannabis peace and truth church and became a founder and long-term resident member of Gaskin’s collective community in Summertown, Tennessee—The Farm.Living at The Farm, Melvyn worked as a farmer, carpenter, mason, vegan chef, miller, head baker, gatekeeper, newspaper editor and worked thirteen months in Guatemala doing volunteer earthquake reconstruction work with a team from the community and Mayans, building rural schools, clinics, houses and a health center for Mother Teresa.After leaving the community in 1984, Melvyn moved to Austin, Texas where he worked as a carpenter, co-director of Casa Marianela refuge, taught vegan cooking and worked in a dozen movies in various capacities—carpenter, set dresser, prop maker, locations, craft service and as an extra. Melvyn now lives in upstate New York, writes, hikes, plays keyboard and speaks around the country.

Book preview

Enlightenment

What’s It Good For

A reporter’s journey over the edge in search of enlightenment

Author’s Back Story

Prologue

to

Voluntary Peasants

Life Inside the Ultimate American Commune: THE FARM

ISBN: 9781005268275

Table of Contents

Prologue: Enlightenment—What’s It Good For, Author’s Back Story 1942—`69

Chapter 1 Greenwich Village Joy Ride

Chapter 2 Life Before Psychedelics and the Internet

Chapter 3 My Life in a Nutshell

Chapter 4 Sold American—Madison Avenue and a Gypsy Good Time

Chapter 5 Soul Search and Rescue

Chapter 6 Discovering the LSD Portal/The Cat with Mystic Eyes

Chapter 7 Following the Energy Over the Edge

Dedication

I dedicate this book to all the good people of the Earth, the real heroes who work to make the world better for all, and I dedicate this book to all the people of The Farm who gave their all to create a gracious lifestyle the world can afford.

This is what Joyce called the monomyth: an archetypal story that springs from the collective unconscious. Its motifs can appear not only in myth and literature, but, if you are sensitive to it, in the working out of the plot of your own life. The basic story of the hero journey involves giving up where you are, going into the realm of adventure, coming to some kind of symbolically rendered realization, and then returning to the field of normal life.

—Joseph Campbell, The Hero with a Thousand Faces

chapter 1

Greenwich Village Joy Ride

The words of the prophets are written on subway walls.

—Simon and Garfunkel, The Sounds of Silence

CEREBRAL SYNAPSES SIZZLE AND SNAP as old memories ignite the vast limitless theater of my mind. White clouds race across the face of an autumn full moon high above the well-lit George Washington Bridge. A black souped-up hot-rod Ford convertible, top down, dual mufflers roaring—races across the bridge towards Manhattan.

Zoom in and see a car full of grinning, joy-riding teenage Jersey boys. I see myself in the back seat, chilly autumn wind in my face. Guys, car, bridge, wind, dark shimmering river below, moon, clouds and starry sky above—mindstuff, all mindstuff.

The year—1957. Destination: Greenwich Village. Happily, we hot-rodded down the West Side Highway along the Hudson River. I breathe deeply brackish smells of the river as we pass wharfs and piers