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Nothing Is Real

The year was 1965. Anger and remorse seemed the dominant emotions of America's youth as the promise of JFK and the New Frontier gave way to LBJ and the old style of politics, including a buildup in Vietnam. The Civil Rights Revolution continued as the media brought into once complacent, middle-class homes images of riots and gassings of mostly young people, black and white. The three top-selling songs of the year had The Rolling Stones bemoaning the lack of satisfaction, the Beatles longing for yesterday, and Bob Dylan asking, "How does it feel to be on your own, with no direction home?"

But for nineteen year-old Jason Royster life wasn't so bad. Sure, the politics of the time upset him, but living in a safe, suburban cocoon in Somerville, Massachusetts sheltered him from personalizing much of the anguish of the times. Starting his sophomore year at Boston University, he had survived the uncertainty of his freshman year with enough B's to match his C's to give him an acceptable if not distinguished foundation. Most of all, he had Megan Sanders hanging onto his arm with both hands, like the girl on the cover of Dylan's Freewheeling.

They had been together through their last two years in high school and, although Megan applied to schools out of state, she chose BU to be close to Jason. Although neither had any idea what they wanted to do with the rest of their lives, they both declared themselves English majors in order to take the same classes.

This proved disastrous, perhaps not for their development as individuals but for their relationship. In an Introduction to Literature class, Megan chose to write about the ironic coming of age of Madam Bovary while Jason praised the lost middle-American values of Nick Carraway in The Great Gatsby. In an oral reading assignment, Jason dramatized the high American energy of Jack Kerouac's On the Road; Megan chose to shock the class with excerpts from Henry Miller's Tropic of Cancer.

"All you do is read about Sal Paradise traveling across county," Megan said while sitting cross-legged in Jason's apartment wearing nothing but her long, black hair. "Don't you want to do it?"

"Sure, I do. Maybe this summer or during spring break."

"I don't mean for a week or two, Jason. I mean…just dropping out of school and going."

Jason could feel his heart pound. "Go where? My parents would kill me."

"Yeah, well, I already feel dead. And we could go wherever we want. You remember Jim Barber from high school? He's living in San Francisco. He invited me … us … to stay with him for a while."

Jason noted the hesitation in Megan's voice. He also remembered Jim Barber, whom Megan dated before they met. "I don't know. What would we do there?"

"Hang out. Same as here. We could take some classes, get a job. Jim waits tables at a club there. He said he can get m … us work."

That evening they went to the movies and saw Darling with Julie Christie and Dirk Bogard. Jason rattled on about how much he loved the payback scene in which Christie returns to Bogard, her first love, after sleeping her way to adventure and fortune. After making love in Bogard's small room, she talks about how she now has enough money for their future. Bogard kicks out of his bed the woman he's never stopped loving, saying "That was just for old times' sake."

Megan was strangely quiet. Soon after, she announced, "I'm going. You can join me if you want."

"I can't now. Maybe at the end of the semester. Or the summer."

And she was gone. They had been inseparable for nearly four years. Jason had only dated a few other girls in high school before Megan, and now he was left thinking about what Megan was doing in San Francisco and whom she was doing it with. The more sorry he felt for himself, the angrier he became, and the more he felt like Dirk Bogard, the sensitive, rejected artist.

Meanwhile, he let his hair grow long and identified with the politics of alienation, redirecting his jealousy to a desire for social justice. He wore black turtlenecks, read Beat poetry and hung out with an artsy crowd of self-alienated young people. He talked of riding a freedom bus South to help with voter registration work, but when three young Civil Rights workers were found dead in Mississippi he decided to stay in Boston and write editorials for the college paper.

Occasionally, he'd get a letter from Megan describing acid trips and the California music scene while his own experiences with marijuana were hindered by asthma attacks. This only added to his frustration.

By his senior year, Vietnam became the dominant issue. Once he graduated, he'd be subject to the draft. With his future uncertain, anger gave way to a combination of rage and fear.

It was at this point that Megan returned.

She was thinner than he remembered. Her dark hair was still long and sexy, but her eyes seemed deeper, sadder, and the left one twitched constantly. She told him stories of wild parties and drug-induced fantasies and of excruciating loneliness and joyless sex. She was ready, she told Jason, to come home if he'd take her back.

They spent most of the next three days in bed. Images of Dirk Bogard and Julie Christie flashed through his mind as did the lyrics to the new Beatles' song, Strawberry Fields Forever: "Living is easy with eyes closed, misunderstanding all you see/It's getting hard to be someone but it all works out/ It doesn't matter much to me."

Megan and Jason married right after his graduation from BU. The plan was for them to join Peace Corps but Jason was drafted instead. He died in Vietnam, Oct. 4, 1968.

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