Extract: Jennifer Juniper

Introduction

When George Harrison and my sister Pattie invited me to join them, along with the rest of the Beatles and their wives, on their trip to Maharishi’s ashram in India, I asked, “But how can I ever repay you?”

“Just be yourself,” George replied.

And that’s it. As I realized many years later, that’s all we ever have to do, just be ourselves.

This is my journey.

It is the story of people I spent time with and what I learned from being part of a unique time in history, when young people changed and shaped our culture forever. Having a certain look that reflected this new era was pure luck; it took me to places I might never have gone. In my thinking and feeling I epitomized what was going on in my generation. I lived and breathed this new world before I became aware of the dramatic shifts we were making.

From the age of sixteen I found myself in the center of the ‘Swinging 60s’ with all its innocence and wonder. Being a house model for up-and-coming young fashion designers Foale and Tuffin brought me into the heart of Carnaby Street, to witness the beginnings of what was to become the center of 60s fashion and pop culture in London.

I wore all the latest and innovative Foale and Tuffin designs for owners of boutiques and editors of glossy magazines; magazines I was later to find myself in once I became a photographic model, including newspapers, fashion catalogues and a couple of short films. I represented the look of that time as I cat-walked and had fashion photographs taken in New York, along with my sister and two other models, for the “Youthquake” movement. We were the first contingent of the huge “British Invasion” in fashion that was about to sweep across America.

I danced with my boyfriend, Mick Fleetwood, at all the latest clubs: The Ad Lib, Crazy Elephant, and The Scotch of St James, where we’d go with my sister Pattie and her boyfriend George Harrison and the rest of The Beatles.

I was enchanted by the spirit of our age. I breathed it in before I knew it was there, it became part of me, and I followed its call. I was a natural ‘Flower Child’ and all it represented; fairy-like and whimsical, and so it was no surprise to find myself inadvertently in San Francisco at the beginning of ‘Flower Power’ in 1967. I was deeply immersed in the counter culture and feel privileged to have been part of a generation that made such an impact on the world, from our outlook on life, to the sexual revolution, mind-opening drugs, metaphysics, and most of all, music. Musicians became the spokespeople of our time; they represented this new age and spoke for the masses.

I worked in The Beatles shop, Apple, the first of its kind, and was interviewed by journalists to describe what the shop represented. We were all idealists and believed we could change the world.

I went to India to study meditation with The Beatles and witnessed their creativity at work while writing songs later to appear on the White Album. I found myself in these pivotal places at a pivotal time in history, living my life without any awareness that one day we would look back at this time as an
inspirational decade.

Although I was at the center of the spiritual bloom and innocence of the 60s, I was also part of the turmoil and decadence of the 70s and 80s. My marriage to Mick Fleetwood, founder member of Fleetwood Mac, brought me to the forefront of rock and roll, of fame, money, drugs and heartache. I struggled in the darkness searching for my own voice, before finding a light at the end of the tunnel. Aged 37, I went to college and studied psychology where I gained a better understanding and came to terms with my life and my actions. Having spent so much of my life in the company of many of the greatest musical legends, those who influenced our culture to this day, I finally found my own creative ability, my own sense of self and purpose. This is what I learned along the way.