I couldn’t possibly do the justice, for example, that CBS Sunday Morning did in their coverage of life in 1963 when “Camelot” was in full swing and the aftermath of the day JFK was shot. It brought back the myriad of emotions I felt so I want to at least try. The program captured many, if not all of the elements that made John Kennedy’s brief presidency resonate so strongly in the hearts and minds of those who lived during that era and even those who came well after, right up until the present day.
My fascination with John Kennedy started on November 6, 1960 when my parents brought my brother and I to Bridgeport Airport in Stratford to watch as his motorcade passed by us. It was a campaign trip and I recall the thrill, perhaps even more so in retrospect after he became president, of seeing him in person.
Yes, it was a fairy tale of sorts, but does that matter? Even as a young girl, I knew that life would never be the same following his death. It’s never really about the reality; it’s almost always about our perception -- how we feel when we see images of the ideal; how we strive to be like Jack and Jackie, the lead players; and how we still mourn the shattered idyll, destroyed so cruelly and so irrevocably.
Many of us who lived during that time can remember those days in November and still feel the overwhelming grief that replaced charm, wit and optimism. I was glued to the black and white TV in our living room from the moment I got home from school that Friday, following the announcement that came over the Trumbull High School PA system. We filed in stunned silence onto school buses. As if the assassination wasn’t enough, the following Sunday, as I continued my TV vigil, I watched, live, as Jack Ruby murdered Lee Harvey Oswald. I shouted down to my mother who was doing laundry in our basement, “Someone just shot Oswald!” Talk about reality TV.
The day JFK died, I wrote down my thoughts on a small piece of lined school loose-leaf paper. I folded it into a small square and tucked it into the hole in the bottom of a hollow ceramic statue that sat on a knick-knack shelf in my bedroom. At some point, I must have destroyed that scrap of paper. I don’t remember when or why. It was probably too painful to keep, to read and to remember. So when I went to look for it years later, sadly it wasn’t there. But I can guess what I wrote: “President Kennedy was assassinated today. I am very sad and I don’t think life will ever be the same.” And somewhere deep inside of me, I know that turned out to be true.
In June 1985, President Ronald Reagan paid tribute to John Kennedy at an event supporting the Kennedy Presidential Library. I found this excerpt worth reading, and rereading, not only as a tribute to the man, but as a reminder of how fast life comes and goes for us all. If we take these words to heart, perhaps we will find in JFK’s enthusiasm for life and his overriding joy in the journey, short as his was, some remnant of the optimism for ourselves that once pervaded our country.
“Everything we saw him do seemed to betray a huge enjoyment of life; he seemed to grasp from the beginning that life is one fast moving train, and you have to jump aboard and hold on to your hat and relish the sweep of the wind as it rushes by. You have to enjoy the journey, it's unfaithful not to. I think that's how his country remembers him, in his joy. And it was a joy he knew how to communicate. He knew that life is rich with possibilities, and he believed in opportunity, growth and action.”
[President Ronald Reagan, June 24, 1985. http://www.jfklibrary.org/About-Us/About-the-JFK-Library/History/1985-Tribute-by-President-Reagan.aspx ]
