I Remember

Rotary phones;
President Nixon resigning and watching Saturday morning kids’ facts about our new President Ford and how he liked ketchup on eggs;
When people smoked on airplanes, in malls: everywhere;
The first shuttle, Enterprise, being tested from the back of a Boeing 747;
Gas for $.59 per gallon;
Disco, bell-bottoms and hip huggers the first time around;
The Bicentennial;
A time before ATMs, when, if you wanted money for the weekend, you had to get to the bank on Friday before it closed;
When McDonalds signs had a number of millions served;
The day John Lennon was shot, the Challenger exploded, and Mt. St. Helens erupted;
The Miami Dolphins' perfect season;
When my aunt and cousin were killed in hurricane Camille;
The Iranian hostage crisis;
The first MTV video;
When HBO came on in the evening only;
Datsuns (the car, not the dog);
The Iran Contra hearings, sitting in my first apartment watching that hot summer while tapping away at a science fiction novel;
The Soviet Union;

I remember the night your mother told me we were going to have a baby. I wrote this:
1/3/2003

"Tonight I learned you existed. There are too many feelings for me to try to express so it’s best to say ‘tonight I learned you existed.’ There will be so much more to talk about…Happy New Year.”

The next day I wrote this:
1/4/2003

“It’s a clear, calm and very cold January morning, quiet as a thief. Ice crystals twinkle along the railing like diamonds. I saw the red morning sun appear over the bay, now gone to sparkling the water for me and Chester.

This morning I devoured an article on quasars. What are quasars might you ask my little inquisitive one? Well, they’re a subset of active galactic nuclei; more specifically and from their acronym Quasi-Stellar Radio Sources, they are the “exhaust”, if you will of black holes. It occurs to me writing this that quasars have been discovered about as long as your father has been alive. You’ll no doubt have much more information to guide your understanding when you’re my age…back to this glorious morning made possible by our own stellar object.

Everything looks different today, and I understand now that nothing will be the same again. Your mother understood that last night watching me pull in. She knew of course—the prerogative of women—and got to decide how she would tell me. She said she thought of how she was about to tell me something that would change my life forever. In her gentle and loving style (you’re going to love her) she wrapped up a baby book and a pregnancy test (positive of course, I re-checked it this morning).

I haven’t stopped thinking about you since…”

You know, thinking about a morning around the house without the booglet seems alien now.

"Oh, this old world keeps spinning ‘round,
It’s a wonder tall trees aint laying down."
Neil Young

UPDATE: I also remember "A Day which will live in infamy!" Happy Birthday Zack.