The Date

Yes, yesterday was Thanksgiving.  We were invited to dinner with dear friends, and had excellent food and unsurpassed company.

At one point, someone mentioned the date.  November 22nd.  And we launched into a discussion about how ours (the hosts' and mine) is the last generation that will have that twist-in-the-gut feeling whenever we see or hear that date.  It has always been a date that made me stop and remember the messages I got about that day growing up, and wondering (once I was old enough) what the world might be if that had simply passed as another day.

Every year that I taught, if the 22nd were a class day, I would ask my students if they knew why it was an important date.  The more years I taught, the fewer hands would go up, and the more quizzical the looks I got.  It would make me sad --- how could they not know?  But do I know, was I told about things that happened 25 - 30 years before I was born?  Not necessarily.  Still, I grew up in a very Kennedy-centric home, and that date. . .  That date. . .