Kennedy Kurses!

                                                              Kennedy Kurses!
                                                                      
                                                                            by
         
                                                                               Jay Agan

     November of '88. Had been back a few months in Ohio after a 4 year stint in Jersey. Was back to start what I thought was going to be a new life & career (Can't complain. Took my chances, made my chioces.)
  
     It was the 25th anniversary of the Kennedy assassination & I'm stuck as a telemarketer for a cheap-jack insulation company that shall remain nameless. I'm into my mid-30s & the kids there were 20-somethings. One gets the idea I'm a piece of living history & would I be so kind as to relate my experience of one of the 20th centurys' defining moments? Sure.
  
     I was in Miss McIlvoys' third grade class at St. Vincents in Mt. Vernon. Principle gets on the pa & announces the pres got shot & to pray for the repose of his soul. Then some creepy choir music was piped in. One kid (who also shall remain nameless) got to laughing over it. Other kids got quiet. I didn't feel affected at all. On the bus home, the high & jr. high kids speculated over what few details they got on the news. Again, no big deal as far as I was concerned. I get home, turn on the set. News. At this hour?
  
     "Jay! The presidents' been shot!" Mom calmly explained to me. And?
 
     Later, it dawned on me. What?! No cartoons?! It was that serious enough to keep me from watching my weekly U.S.D.A. required dose of brain rot? I didn't think so.
  
     Needless to say, the kiddies at work weren't too thrilled over this first hand account of MY ENCOUNTER WITH HISTORY(!) (Insert light show here.). One he-bitch whined indignantly over my cheating him out of some hoped for profound insight.
  
     Strange as it seems, coming from a film fan, but I never was into hype & the cult of celebrity. Especially when it comes to politicians of whatever stripe.
  
    What did these fools expect from me? Something sage sounding & momentous? An unforgetable anecdote from one who was "in the moment"? Oh, come on! I was a kid. 9 years old. As a child, I thought & lived as one. I had a childs' priorities. And it was through the eyes of one I remember it.
   
    I'm not trying to be mean or callous about this. It was a terrible thing that happened. BUT:

   Anyone who was a little kid at that time telling you about "a profound sense of loss", etc. is full of it. He/she was just as ticked off as I was about no cartoons that dreary Thanksgiving weekend in November '63. Nuff said.

                                                     Article copyright © Jay Agan

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