The Big Bang, The Buddha, and the Baby Boom

February 10, 2003
Who doesn't love a good flashback? Baby boomers in particular will enjoy this wry, hip, fast, breezy account by journalist and alternative radio newsman Nisker (Crazy Wisdom; Buddha's Nature). A Nebraska-born Jew, Nisker has practiced Buddhism for decades, but he could be also be a poster child for the multitude of religious and spiritual journeys through the American landscape. Anchored for many years in San Francisco with a long-running radio show, Nisker had the entrée
and opportunities to experience intensely the rolling panoply of American religion. Through a highly personalized lens he tracks, among other topics, the beat poets, hippies, global travel, Eastern meditation, New Age methods, scientific frontiers, eco-spirituality, men's spirituality, Gandhian economics and the current state of political affairs. From moving through the marijuana mist at the Monterey Pop Festival to viewing the neon "Om" sign at sunset at Swami Muktananda's Bombay ashram to conversing one-on-one with the Dalai Lama before he won the Nobel Peace Prize, Nisker seems to have been everywhere when something cool or significant was happening. The sweetness in his journey is in the optimism stamped throughout this passport to times gone by and times to come. This is a good read for anyone interested in pop culture, but for boomers who want to look in the rear view mirror for a clearer glimpse of what's ahead, Nisker's romp is a tender triumph.