Posted on Thu, Jun. 30, 2005
Rainbows seek peace, fellowship at annual gathering
VICKI SMITH
Associated Press
HILLSBORO, W.Va. - Some come every year, drawn to the Rainbow Family gathering for reasons as varied as the brilliant streaks in their tie-dyed T-shirts. It's a place where every woman is a "sister," every man a "brother." A place where "Welcome home" is the standard greeting but where no house stands.
For some of the 4,000 camped out this week in the Monongahela National Forest, the gatherings are a vacation from jobs and reality. For others, they are a chance to live without authority, structure or money. Some people pray for peace, to be part of something larger than themselves. And some, like the homeless, come because they have nowhere else.
"A lot of times, it's the only place all year where they feel at home," says Stone, a slim, bespectacled medical student from Chicago who, like many Rainbows, does not use his real name at the gathering.
"Here, what can you do if you're an accountant?" he says. "It doesn't mean anything."
What does? Building a kitchen. Digging a latrine trench. Slapping together a pingpong table from plywood and two-by-fours.
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