Where Were You When . . .

The loss of Teddy Kennedy early this morning will have massive repercussions, I think, in the tone that will be set in the Senate. This is the loss of a man, not of virtue mind you, but of vision. You want virtue? Go and talk to a plant.

The rightwing is going to be hopping with glee over the death of a man who did more to improve their lives than any 10 Republican senators, but go figure. If you doubt my words, I cite a portion of the lyrics of a You Tube video link that was sent to me today:

“One

Single payer system

Let’s do it for Uncle Ted,

Pretty soon he’s dead

It’s time to

Get . . . it . . . done.”

Get my point?

And I just now have learned that the wingnuts are sending email to each other signed with the number 14,648. This is, I am told, the number of days that Ted Kennedy was alive. What a sick, sick tribe.

So these things set me off a little this afternoon, and it is nowhere near what I wanted to write about today about the loss of the last Kennedy brother.

“Where were you when you heard that Kennedy was assassinated?”

That is a common question that those of us who were alive (and aware) during the 60’s. That is because the losses of Jack and Bobby Kennedy were so sudden and shocking.

When I first heard that Jack Kennedy was shot I was in a 5^th grade classroom doing arithmetic. When I heard that he was dead I was in a room with all 5^th grade classes as our teachers took turns at the television.

I was coloring.

Then they dismissed school early. I walked home and when I walked through the door my father was there painting the family room. He asked me why I was home so early.

My father worked for Kennedy during the ’60 campaign. My parents threw an Inauguration Day party – the first one I ever experienced.

He didn’t know what had happened. He was painting. It was my sad task to tell this man that Jack Kennedy was dead.

I was awoken from a deep sleep by my sister early on June 7^th 1968 when she gave me the shocking news that Bobby Kennedy, the man who was going to end the Vietnam War, had been gunned down in LA.

Both events were shocking and both events have etched themselves deeply in my memory.

I wonder whether the passing of Teddy Kennedy will etch as deeply. We were all steeled to the inevitability of his passing so the shock factor is not there. The effect, however, is just as calamitous had he been President or a very promising presidential candidate. To me, he represented a voice of reason among the eerily shrill.

Where was I when I heard that Teddy Kennedy had passed?

Looking for a pair of socks to wear.