That November day, getting off the bus at 14 into my sobbing mother’s arms is seared into my memory. The saddest week I had ever experienced followed. I had never lost a family member and this was my first experience with such enormous grief that shook the nation. My brother and I had spent the following weekend with our Josselyn grandparents. They lived within sight down the street, my maternal grandparents lived next to us, where T and I live now. The old black and white television was on, the accused assassin, Lee Harvey Oswald was being transferred to prison. Jack Ruby entered the Dallas police headquarters without issue, approached Oswald and shot him on live national NBC TV with millions, including me watching. Those days are seared into my memories like a movie.
My dad took the central photograph when we saw the President and First Lady leaving church in Hyannis MA, on Cape Cod. President Kennedy drove the limo away from the church that day. I remember it like a movie, we were so excited. My mother saved the newspaper clipping with the photo of JFK driving the limo himself, a first from the church and a very memorable day for me.
Some of the photos in the collage are from a visit to the JFK Library in Boston.
Impossibly Close
my dad’s ansco
camera image reversed
reflecting, recording
a sunny sunday morning
hyannis, old cape cod
the president prince
our jackie veiled
emerge from church
impossibly close
to crowds in silent awe
salt air electric
blue smokey
flash bulbs popping
super eight cameras
clicking, panning
string neckties
and netted hats
camelot’s couple
approach the shiny
leather seated limos
but wait
she gets in
but he
motions those squinting
men who guard and serve
he’ll drive today
and off they go
compound bound
impossibly close
to me
For the Record,
This day came in dark and rainy, places north and west got snow on this heavy Thanksgiving travel day. Luckily, we just have to walk through the woods tomorrow to Sarah and David's for our Thanksgiving dinner.
I retired from public school teaching after happily spending twenty eight years playing in Kindergarten. Now I fill my days watching cat antics, taking endless...
I also remember it very well. I was 13 years old then......and was at school having a Maths lesson. The Head came in and whispered to our maths teacher.......we wondered if someone was in trouble !..Then our Maths teacher told us what had happened that day in the USA.....we were all very shocked....he was something of an icon, being relatively young (whereas most presidents were very old.....to us 13 year olds anyway).......he was vey rock'n'roll.
That fall I lost my great aunt and went to my first funeral. Then my grandfather died, next my grandmother, and lastly Kennedy. My curiosity about funerals was gone and I have hated them ever since. I to this day call myself a Kennedy Democrat. Which means I have been around too many people who think I am too liberal.
Great collection of memories here.
(I’m Australian and because of the time difference this actually happened on a sunny Saturday morning in Sydney. We were in the town doing the weekly shopping. There was an election coming up and the politician on the hustings broke the news to stunned shoppers. I don’t usually remember stuff but I certainly remember this day.)
November 23rd, 2023
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(I’m Australian and because of the time difference this actually happened on a sunny Saturday morning in Sydney. We were in the town doing the weekly shopping. There was an election coming up and the politician on the hustings broke the news to stunned shoppers. I don’t usually remember stuff but I certainly remember this day.)