Fiftieth Anniversary

Today is the fiftieth anniversary of John Kennedy's death. However, the fiftieth anniversary of me won't take place till next year, which is to say: I am a member of the first generation of babies to have no relationship whatsoever to Kennedy's death, not even a "my mother was pushing me in my baby carriage when . . . " anecdote. On November 22, 1963, I wasn't conceived yet.

When I was growing up, I heard, of course, about Kennedy and his doings and his charms and his philandering and his murder, etc., etc. But I was far more interested in Jackie. By the time I remember her, she was no longer a black-and-white portrait of a widow, with a little hat and a tidy dress and Aqua Net hair and two bewildered children. Now she was a staple of colorful 1970s celebrity photos--long hair whipping in the seabreeze, giant sunglasses--and she was married to a toad-like Picasso-esque guy who was named, of all things, Aristotle.

How could those women in the photos be the same person? One was so neat and girdled. The other was flapping in the wind. And then there was the other question: Husband Number 1 was a perpetually young, coiffed, and handsome statesman, whereas Husband Number 2 was a perpetually chunky old bald guy in a bathing suit. What on earth was she thinking to marry a man who looked like that?

It all makes more sense now that I've reached the chunky old bald guy stage myself. But as a child, I think I would have preferred to witness endless Miss Havisham-like despair rather than a coming-to-terms-with-grief-by-taking-up-a-swinging-seventies-lifestyle-on-a-yacht. Girls can be very romantic but also cruel. They know they will never be old, and have little patience with people who make such a mistake.

Margaret Atwood's novel Cat's Eye considers that surprise: when suddenly we've traded places with those scornful girls and become the strange old bag on the street.

I am transitional; some days I look like a worn-out thirty-five, others like a sprightly fifty. So much depends on the light, and the way you squint. . . . 

Lately I've caught myself humming out loud, or walking along the street with my mouth slightly open, drooling a little. Only a little, but it may be the thin edge of the wedge, the crack in the wall that will open, later, onto what? What vistas of shining eccentricity, or madness?

You want to hear the truth? I hum out loud. Tom pointed it out to me the other day. "Do you know you do that?" he asked. Well, sometimes I notice . . . after I've been humming out loud for God knows how long. This is a problem in quiet places such as the grocery store and other people's poetry readings and the stalls of public bathrooms. But if I were humming out loud on a yacht next to a chunky guy in a bathing suit, the wind would be so noisy that no one would notice.