Where Were You on 11/22/63?

I was born in 1969. I wasn't there. I missed the '60's in a big way, though I was old enough a decade later to make my decision that Carter was preferable to Reagan, though I could not vote. I happened to be home sick the day Reagan was shot, and saw it in real time.,

I happened to talk to my father today, about Thanksgiving, and his wife's birthday (which is tomorrow but we're celebrating on Sunday evening) and make plans to drive down to Massachusetts from Maine. The conversation turned to Kennedy, and the assassination.

I asked the question: "Where where you, Daddy, when Kennedy was shot?"

Here's how it went:

Daddy: I was driving home from NU in Boston. I heard the news in the car.

Me: What car? The VW?

Daddy: No, the old DeSoto, there was a radio in that car. We didn't know just what had happened, I was listening though.

Me: So, what happened?

Daddy: We still didn't know. Ask your mother, she always came home from redacted (work, down the street)to see the soaps at work with your great-grandmother. She went back to work. Why are you asking me this?

Me: I just want to know, you know, I want to know.

Daddy: I don't want to talk about it. It was horrible. I don't want to talk about it. But I'll tell you, it was a lot like the First Gulf War: you didn't know what was going to happen, or why it happened. You didn't know. Anything could have happened. It was quite a scare. The Russians could have done anything.

Clearly, it made an impression on my Father. I asked him what the family household thought. Now, I know, because I have asked my grandparents and my great grandmother about it. I know how the house took it. But it's interesting that it still makes the kind of impression on my father, who was a Sophomore in college, that he still doesn't want to talk about it.

Interesting.