I don’t like to reveal my age. First ? because I’m a gentleman, and secondly ? because I don’t want anyone to know. That being said, I’m going to divulge something which should give anyone who’s at all interested, a pretty fair idea of just how old I am.
I’m old enough to recall the day President John F. Kennedy was assassinated. It was on November 22, 1963, that a sniper’s bullet struck the President while seated in the back of an unprotected limousine in a motorcade in Dallas.
Younger Americans undoubtedly have a sense of the impact Kennedy’s assassination had on our country, but only those with some years on us can remember the utter horror of that day. It was a terrible moment in American history, and the country has not been the same since.
It may be difficult to compare or contrast the Kennedy assassination with the events of September 11, 2001, or December 7, 1941, for that matter. But personally, that day was the saddest and darkest in our country’s modern history.
Not only did the assassination bring an end to the life of a young, vibrant and intelligent leader, it represented the end of America’s former innocence.
On November 22, 1963, and in the days that followed until Kennedy’s funeral dirge made its way down Pennyslvania Avenue, Americans of every ilk and political persuasion shared a common sadness.
It was also the time when the medium of television came of age. Like millions of others, I was glued to the television for the ensuing days, feeling the sadness and trying to make sense of the tragedy.
And like so many others, I was watching, too, when the television cameras caught the moment when presumed assassin Lee Harvey Oswald was mortally wounded by Jack Ruby. Yet another instant imbedded in a generation’s consciousness.
In the years to come, the killings of Martin Luther King and Robert Kennedy revealed the increasingly violent nature of our society. These events coincided with political unrest and social change not seen since the Civil War. There were race riots in our cities; an unpopular war in Vietnam; and the beginnings of a class struggle that haunts our nation to this day.
A lot of people talk about how the world has changed since 9-11. And it has.
When fundamentalist religious zealots strap bombs to their bodies and incinerate themselves and innocent civilians for a cause, we’re all in a heap of trouble.
Now, even the world’s most powerful army finds itself bogged down against an enemy that wears no uniform, flies no flag and whose weapons are homemade.
Life seemed so much simpler back in 1963. That is until November 22nd.
For me, that day remains the single-most unsettling in our nation’s history. Because even if only symbolically, it felt like this country’s best opportunity for greatness had suddenly slipped away.
And 43 years later, it still feels that way.
C.J. Note: Tom Wearing is the new editor of The Lake Orion Review. I just got back from a week of deer hunting and didn’t have any column ideas, so I gave Tom my space seeing as he’s an OK guy and his column fit pretty good.