Days of History

I remember...........................I remember.

I remember watching an 8mm movie being projected on a screen in a darkened class room with no sound. I remember thinking what was the big deal and that I didn't really understand what they were trying to show us. Just a flash of memory, I know now it was a news reel of Nixon's inauguration, but I didn't know that then when I was watching it. It was just another day in 1st grade of trying to understand what I was supposed to know and do and what I wasn't supposed to do.

I remember................I remember.

I remember reading the Youngstown Vindicator (the local newspaper) and thinking Water Gate was about the Milton Reservoir Dam, which was near my home, and how the dam was deteriorating and I didn't understand why a dam breaking caused us to have another president, but it must be serious. I remember asking if the new president, Gerald Ford, would be able to fix the water gates on the dam and stop the flooding. Obviously I was confused! I was 11. Are kids smarter today or are they just as confused as I was about national and local events?

I remember.......................I remember.

I remember watching the inauguration of Jimmy Carter on TV in civics class my freshman year of High School. He had such a southern accent to my Midwestern ears is all I can remember and that I was still wondering what I was suppose to know and do, but I had figured out well what I wasn't supposed to do, but in my teenage arrogance I was positive I wasn't confused any more and that I knew EVERYTHING!

I remember.....................I remember.

I remember hearing on the radio in the car that Reagan was sworn in as the 40th president that day, but I was busy trying to figure out how to drive in that Atlanta traffic and what I supposed to do and not to do on surface streets where the direction of traffic changes with the time of day and being busy trying to listen to professors with not only southern accents, but Indian accents and French accents.

I remember...................I remember.

I remember the passing of time.................The first Bush, Clinton, and the second Bush. I was trying to figure out what I was suppose know and do and not to do with two small children. I remember being confused about how the direction of American Democracy seemed to be changing, as fast as the traffic in Atlanta, but I was busy, too busy trying to listen to the babble and cry of little baby voices to hear the babble and cries of the American public.

I Will Remember...........................I Will Remember.

I Will Remember this Day. This day is just another day of so many Days in American History. We, the American Public, will inaugurate a new president. I have been watching the events of the day on CNN.com. I am taking the day to remember: 8mm films, newspapers, TV, radio and the Internet, reflecting on trying to figure out what I am suppose to do and not to do, hearing voices and trying to know what they are saying to me and trying to know which way to go and how to keep up in a changing world.

I will remember that I have done my best daily with the time, knowledge and resources that I have had at my disposal. I will remember that it is best to listen more than I speak, for I am better all these years later at hearing and understanding the babbles and cries and accents of my small world here in Connecticut and the international world brought to me thanks to technology. Like the changing directions on Atlanta's surface street, I will remember that this day in history, this single day, we have the hope that we will be able to change. This single day, I have the hope that I will be able to change.