Tag: history

JFK Jr. Devil or Angel? Baby Boomers Really Don’t Care

The television movie about JFK Jr. and his wife Carolyn Bessette’s death seems to be creating a litany of criticism or support from various factions. I’ve given this some thought and it’s an interesting dynamic at work, but why?

Getting older means although the mind may be slowing a little, memories seem more vivid. I’m not certain whether that’s because it doesn’t seem as long ago anymore, or the feelings we felt when we were young come rushing back more quickly now.

Even simple things like a favorite pizza conjure up the sensibility of being with friends and loving that particular food.

Strangely, I never seem to be able to recapture the taste of the foods from my youth, only the impressions. So why should a TV movie have so much to do with childhood feelings?

John F. Kennedy Jr.’s death seemed to resonate differently according to your generation. To some an ending, to some nothing.

I’ve noticed young people don’t regard the Kennedy name with the same reverence as Baby Boomers.

Listening to the way John John is being described, I’ve taken the time to try and discover why.

It’s clear that despite the fact President John F. Kennedy was not by any means a saint, Baby Boomers still embrace his memory. Why?

I can only speak for myself, but my recollections of the first three years of the 1960s are still very vivid and emotionally charged.

This is in great part due to the fact JFK’s death was one of those once in a lifetime

experiences you seem to carry with you forever.

That week was burned in my soul and changed not only the world, but me. I’m certain I’m not the only one who feels that way.

The question, “Where were you when JFK was shot?” comes up on most first dates for Baby Boomers. Perhaps silly, but true because it unites us in a special way, a shared moment in time that forms a bond. Instant recall of a moment that lives on inside us.

For those too young to know I will describe America on November 22, 1963.

We were shocked and filled with a painful and overwhelming sadness. As though we’d fallen into a bottomless black hole that encased our entire body and soul.  

Like robots programmed to sit, watch and sob. Tears fell without any inducement at the sights and sounds we witnessed, as one shocking and devastating moment continued to emerge from our television sets.

Life stopped and we sat glued to the screen incapable of movement or joy.

When Lee Harvey Oswald was murdered in front of our eyes in real time, we fell deeper down a shock spiral uncertain of whether awake or dreaming. Time stopped, we sat.

The pain seemed to hover in the air above our homes, neighborhoods and cities like a dark cloud of despair.

Memories come flooding back today as glimpses into a past we’ve carried with us a lifetime.

Jackie’s blood-soaked pink suit, a convertible speeding through the streets as she climbed on the trunk, her face when Lyndon Johnson took the oath of office on the plane.

The sound of horses’ hoofs clopping along down Pennsylvania avenue pulling a military ammunition wagon with a flag-draped coffin. Then probably one of the most heart wrenching moments of our entire generation, John John saluting as the casket passed. A Dallas police station and another shocking murder.

The day JFK was killed conjures up more than just tragedy, it evokes the sentiments of a time in America that died with JFK and can never be reborn.

That child saluting his martyred father is something none of us could ever forget. More than just a young boy’s goodbye to a parent.

JFK’s death also marks the day when the guns came out in America and never left. The turning point for a nation that changed into a violent gun-toting jungle that continues its non-stop steady fall into chaos.

A day that marked the end of post-war America, and ushered in a new era filled with anger, mistrust and violence.

Gone was the sense of optimism that prevailed when the WWII soldiers came home and the building of a country began. Those upbeat feelings of hope and excitement for the future were replaced. Sadly, to be ever marked by assassination, blood and shock after shock as we witnessed the fall from that heady pedestal we occupied.

It was a strange new America. One fraught with protests, marches, anger, hatred, guns and more guns as we struggled to find a way out of the incredible pain to which we’d awakened on November 22nd.

Life went on of course, but in a new land, one without a young inspiring leader. JFK embodied the very soul of youth and hope for a future filled with the promise of a post war era.

Now violence set the tone, there were new streets filled with crime, protests and hostility.

Did America turn into something different overnight? No, of course not. It was a gradual metamorphosis, subtle and slow. Metastasizing to pockets and places in a society that never imagined this darkness ever existed.

That is why when Jackie Kennedy’s reference to Camelot was introduced it became the theme song of a generation. Before it all changed. Before the America Baby Boomers knew morphed into a strange and unfamiliar place lacking adolescent innocence.

Stumbling along without that vibrant, handsome leader and his beautiful family to inspire us to greatness. To be better versions of ourselves, and to “ask not what our country could do for us, but what we could do for our country.”

Is it any wonder we miss him, flaws and all?

Is it so strange that when we see John John we witness a missed opportunity to restore the America we loved, but can never return?  

Were the Kennedy’s perfect people? No, not at all. Did we know that then? No, we didn’t. Would most Baby Boomers say they are happy we found out how imperfect they were? I doubt it. I’d prefer living with my memories of a simpler time, a hopeful one, in a far different America. As we age into a world we no longer understand or recognize do we need those memories of happier times? Indeed.  

Am I ignoring the darker underpinnings of America then? Of course, but my memories are subjective, albeit not always realistic.

I often wonder what this country would be today had Kennedy lived to continue his stewardship and positive march forward into his U.S.A. If guns and violence hadn’t been given an open invitation to entrench their evil into the fabric of that quiet, lovely country that felt undemanding, safe and optimistic.

One that inspired all of us and the entire world.  

To me when someone criticizes JFK Jr. it’s as if each word knocks another jewel off a resplendent Faberge egg. Until it becomes a hollow shell lacking the luster and beauty by which it once dazzled.

Are we merely waxing nostalgic when Baby Boomers choose to hang onto the gleaming perfection of a place where we once lived and thrived?

I wish today’s generations could understand and experience even a small part of our America, our illusion, our Camelot.

The City That Never Sleeps Or is That Should be Put to Sleep?

“It couldn’t have happened anywhere but in little old New York.” O Henry

As story and recollection go it was merely an accident that my father left my mother on the New York State Thruway rest stop gas station at two in the morning. As I am the only one left to remember I assure you I have thought carefully about this incident over the years. Partly to ensure it is not forgotten and partly to discern its intention.

Long ago content my father was merely not aware my mother had stepped out of the car from resting in the back of the station wagon with my brother and I, the subject was a source of humor.

Now I’m not so sure. About the intent I mean. As I grew older and my Freudian radar increased, the fact it was a simple mistake by an exhausted driver no longer rings as true.

Were it not for the truth of my parent’s marriage that stares me in the face, I could put the matter to rest. Like a dead squirrel on the side of the road, or thruway as the case may be.

I was asleep in the back of the new chevy station wagon when I awoke after my father asked loudly if my mother was there. “No,” I answered sleepily and suddenly felt the brakes slam on and a sudden charge of the car backward.

My father apparently realized my mother wasn’t sleeping and began the process of backing up on the thruway on ramp for what seemed miles.

So surprised, I was speechless until I saw my mother standing at the gas pump. Braless and almost barefoot, clothed only in shorts and a blouse whose buttons were struggling to cover my mother’s ponderous breasts.

I can’t remember if anything was said when she reentered the car. In fact, probably nothing was said for quite a while.  We’re talking days here, folks. I do remember my mother muttering something about the gas station attendant thinking she was a whore, but of course I didn’t even understand the word at that age. Yes, I know hard to believe we were so naive back in the day, isn’t it?

Of course, my father struggled to explain he was unaware she’d left the car for the ladies room while he paid the bill, and well it was all rather understandable really.

But was it? Or just an unconscious attempt by my father to take advantage of a rare opportunity to free himself? Lord knows the man dreamed and talked about it his entire life. Escaping from my mother I mean. So, the possibility of such an achievement must have been enticing.

Although knowing my father as I did, it seems quite unlikely he’d ever have been able to carry out such a feat.

I always attributed the incident to simply the icing on a disaster cake that was our trip to New York in the fifties. It began with my father telling my eight-year-old brother to wait for him in the doorway of the Astor Hotel while he bought something in the gift shop.

My brother wandered away looking for him and chose the wrong door of the two that led outside. Yep, seems my Dad wasn’t as tuned in as he should have been that trip.

After police and house detectives began a search for him it all felt exciting, like a real life TV detective show. I was far too young to comprehend the gravity of the situation then, but today it still haunts me. We received word the police had found a boy wandering the streets alone and taken him to the station. He was served an ice cream cone. Yes, that was the New York City police ladies and gentlemen, back during civilization. He was returned to us, scared, anxious, but well fed.

That evening my father and I saw The Music Man on Broadway which was great. At least until we entered Sardi’s restaurant where they wouldn’t let my father in without a suit jacket. They offered up a beige rag of a frock which he donned before sitting. Then we both sat embarrassed and unhappy during the overpriced meal.

Sardi’s food has become even more overpriced now and the dress code far less English Royal Court, but the memory lingers on. I did go back there once many years later, but the food was still seasoned with mortification and sadness for my Dad. Sadly, a reputed restaurant a child was so excited to try, offered up a menu that included an understanding of the word humiliation.

By now you’re probably wondering if I ever returned to New York. Yes, I did on numerous occasions, but I’d be lying if I told you any of those trips ever made up for or even came close to that time, which still burns in my brain.

When I think of New York my memory immediately plays mental pictures of my mother standing frightened at the gas pump and my brother crying. Of a rude maître d holding a schmatta jacket accompanied by a desire to never return and experience those feelings again. And yes, there were happy moments on that trip, but sadly I guess the image of a Big Apple with a worm inside remains.

The words written to laud NYC are plentiful, but perhaps New York really is as Ralph Waldo Emerson described it…”a sucked orange.”