Dealey Plaza

 

November 22, 1963 was a Friday.  I was five years old, and not in kindergarten until the next fall.

So I was outside playing and went indoors for some reason.  As you came in the front door of our house in Akron, Ohio, straight ahead were stairs leading up to the second floor.  To the left was a dining room and a kitchen, separated by a fascinating (to me) swinging door.  

To the right was the living room.  My parents were standing in the living room, sort of crying softly.  The television set was on.

Grown-ups crying was strange and unusual, to me.

People watching TV in the middle of the day was strange and unusual.

And people watching TV while standing up was weird, too.

        I stood silent and motionless in the doorway.  I didn't have any words to describe this scenario.  I couldn't read and write yet, though I could write my name and say the letters of the alphabet.  However, these skills and memorizations did not cover this situation.

I guess I asked what was wrong and someone answered, "President Kennedy has been killed."

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I only knew President Kennedy's name, at that time, because my mother had been reading the fairy tales aloud to me, and since there was always a King or Queen in those stories, I asked her one day, "Who is the King of our country?"

And she looked kind of surprised and said, "Well, we don't have a king.  We are a democracy, we have a president.  The people vote for him." 

        That sounded good to me.

"So, who is our president?"

"Kennedy."

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On You Tube type in

Jumpin' Jack Flash

uploader / channel:  The Rolling Stones

        and Play.

♫ ♫ ♪

One, two!

I was born -- in a crossfire hurricane

And I howled at the morning drivin' rain

But it's all -- right -- now, in fact it's a gas

But it's all right, I'm jumpin' jack flash

It's a gas, gas, gas...

-30-