BIG DAY

It is 5:55 a.m. and 19.1 degrees, kinda chilly. Patrick is here with me staring at the space heater and Junior is at a friend's.

There are three non-personal major national events in my life that stand out. They are those kind of days that you never forget. When you remember exactly where you were and what you were doing when they happened.

Probably for all of us, the most recent is the Muslim attack on the Twin Towers. I was at work that morning, and had just come off the factory floor into the offices, when I walked by the conference room, saw several people standing around a TV set. The towers had been hit. I spent a long time there--we were all stunned...

Now, rolling back quite a few years, I remember when I was in Basic Combat Training at Harmony Church, Ft. Benning, Ga. when Neil Armstrong supposedly walked on the moon. I was walking by an orderly room, glanced in the window by chance and saw a Small TV set up and lingered long enuff to hear what was going on...

On this very day in 1963, I was in High School in Dunedin, Florida, passing in the hall from one class to the next, when a girl with a blank stare on her face passed me and said to me "The President's been shot!" I believed her.

A bunch of us had seen JFK a few days earlier in Tampa give a speech, cutting class to do so...

I was a political junkie even then and a Goldwater for President Supporter. I was in the habit of writing one line "Bon Mots" as the teacher called them, every morning on the homeroom blackboard. They covered a range of topics, not just political.

That morning I had written "What this country needs is another good President."

Not the way I meant it, of course. Nov. 22, 1963. We all grew up on that day.

So it goes.

Do you remember where you were?

Lincoln - Kennedy coincidences

1) Lincoln was elected in 1860, Kennedy in 1960, 100 years apart

2) Both men were deeply involved in civil rights for African Americans.

3) Both men were assassinated on a Friday, in the presence of

their wives.

4) Each wife had lost a child while living at the White House.

5) Both men were killed by a bullet that entered the head from behind.

6) Lincoln was killed in Ford's Theater. Kennedy met his death while

riding in a Lincoln convertible made by the Ford Motor Company.

7) Both men were succeeded by vice-presidents named Johnson who were

southern Democrats and former senators.

8) Andrew Johnson was born in 1808. Lyndon Johnson was born in 1908,

exactly one hundred years later.

9) The first name of Lincoln's private secretary was John, the last

name of Kennedy's private secretary was Lincoln.

10) John Wilkes Booth was born in 1839 [according to some sources] Lee

Harvey Oswald was born in 1939, one hundred years later.

11) Both assassins were Southerners who held extremist views.

12) Both assassins were murdered before they could be brought to trial.

13) Booth shot Lincoln in a theater and fled to a warehouse. Oswald

shot Kennedy from a warehouse and fled to a theater.

14) LlNCOLN and KENNEDY each has 7 letters.

15) ANDREW JOHNSON and LYNDON JOHNSON each has 13 letters.

16) JOHN WlLKES BOOTH and LEE HARVEY OSWALD each has 15 letters.

17) A Licoln staffer Miss Kennedy told him not to go to the Theater. A Kennedy

staffer Miss Lincoln, told him not to go to Dallas.

GO GATORS! BEAT BULLDOGS!