
This November 22, Americans will both celebrate Thanksgiving and commemorate the 44th anniversary of President Kennedy’s assassination. I was 9 years old on that remarkable day and no medium, no matter how ingenious or sensational the film or book or whatever, could fully convey the impression left on us who were alive and aware at the time. The sequence of events that highlighted those four days, from the shots in Dealey Plaza to Oswald’s murder to Kennedy’s funeral (the aftermath which affects even today) will be always be remembered by the “baby boomer” generation.
The day was unseasonably warm, even though I had long remembered it as being cold. Maybe because the cold front that in fact moved in that night and into that long, unforgettable weekend overwhelmed it all with appropriate coldness.
Mr. Reichart, my piano teacher, was due at four o’clock for yet another one of my dreaded lessons. I think he dreaded them far more than I did, and was as anxious to see me as finding a fly in his musical ointment. He was a short, reddish-faced man on the nervous side of obesity and despair, with a neck that was perpetually too big for his collar and looked as if it was getting bigger with each visit and about to explode. I think he was German or Austrian, and when I went through his forcefully directed series of scales and chords that would inevitably result in chop-sticks and chaos, his neck took on an even more explosive look.

I may have been thinking of Herr R’s impending visit as I sat in my fourth grade classroom waiting for the three o’clock bell. There was also Thanksgiving (and food) to think about that would arrive the next Thursday, and then Christmas (and, of course, more food and presents), then New Year’s and beyond. My life as a Catholic school kid was basically confined to school and church and (most importantly) play…(and, of course, those piano lessons). I knew little (except for a child’s often distorted view learned through geography and history books) of life outside of Brooklyn, New York…and even that was limited to the blocks within my immediate neighborhood. In the days and ways before Google Earth and Frequent Flyer Miles and Cable TV and the like, a savviness of the world wasn’t as easily acquired by a child (not even by most adults). The West to New York kids meant the “Old West” of movies, television and myth. Dallas, Texas on that Friday (that now seems so long ago) was no exception.
I doubt that I had any clear understanding of death on November 22, 1963. No one that I personally knew had yet died; and those that I saw “die” were always characters on TV shows such as RAWHIDE and THE UNTOUCHABLES, and these were sure to forever return in another role (sometimes in the same series). Even though Pope John XXIII had died that summer, we were led to believe that he possessed extraordinary powers; I simply concluded that death couldn’t have any serious affect on anyone famous or in positions of power. Even though kids my age during that autumn knew the name John F. Kennedy, they were as familiar with him as they would have been with the intricacies of Washington, D.C….but he was a powerful individual and, like Pope John, deserved our respect.

When Sister Margery, who was as emotional as Ming the Merciless, came into our classroom with tears in her eyes, we knew that something serious had happened. Nothing short of our very own Our Lady of Guadalupe being closed down (as in THE BELLS of SAINT MARY’S), a “FOR SALE” sign swinging in the wind, could have elicited such emotion in her. She talked with Miss Madden (our teacher for that year; a Big Sister rather than a Sister to us all) who also began to weep.
Miss Madden finally announced to the class that President Kennedy had been shot in Dallas and was dead. Amidst the genuine and obligatory sobs and moans we soon discovered are expected on such occasions, we felt a sincere grief for someone we had known all along…and would know even more in coming days.
Our dismissal was delayed until it was clear that a state of war didn’t exist (in the event that the Russians were responsible for Kennedy’s killing). When I arrived home, television programming was exclusively devoted to Kennedy’s assassination; there would be much to see on television that weekend, unlike anything seen on it before. Mr. Reichart, of course, canceled my piano lesson but would come (owing to Thanksgiving) the Friday after next. For some reason, he seemed a little more friendly and I a little more attentive to his piano instruction. I could skip TV for now and study piano…maybe I didn’t have forever to practice, as I had once thought.
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Note: Perhaps we over-glorify and overrate JFK and his importance, amid our disappointment with current leaders and their apparent pettiness. Maybe in our despair we attempt to “fill-in” the blank pages of history with hope rather than with fact : idealizing what could have been within the harsh reality of what has turned-out to be. In any event, there shouldn’t be any limits set on the American Dream…tired and worn as it too has turned-out to be.

(For really extensive information on the assassination of President Kennedy, visit The Mary Ferrell Foundation: maryferrell.org)
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