On the passing of Ted Kennedy

I was nine years old when President Kennedy was assassinated in 1963. I have vague memories of riding the school bus home on that day, of sad people, of the riderless horse in the funeral cortège, of little John-John in his funeral suit, of Jacqueline Kennedy in black, Lyndon Johnson... Oswald... Jack Ruby... guns...

And then later, conspiracy theories, the Warren Commission... Then Bobby Kennedy, dead on a hotel's kitchen floor. Martin, dead on a balcony. Riots. Burning, burning, burning.

If you don't remember this first-hand and it sounds to you like times were bad, well, they were. There were, of course, many good things: The Civil Rights Act of 1964. The Beatles, and so much other fabulous, enduring music.

But when there's a historical program on TV dealing with the 1960's, I'm very careful about deciding whether or not to watch it, because it was a pretty chaotic time, and, with the Vietnam War underscoring the entire period (our involvement lasted sixteen years), the whole era has a nightmarish quality to it. You know how, even with a nightmare, there can still be good moments? For me, it's a little like that.

When I awoke this morning to the news of Ted Kennedy's death, I cried. My wife and I cried together when I told her. I'm crying a little right now. There's a part of me that's saying, “Why are you crying? He was just another politician.” The crying part of me doesn't argue the point, because that isn't the point.

I think that, when you're nine years old, it's pretty hard to fathom something like an assassination. It doesn't make sense. You can't touch it or smell it. It happened far from my Miami Beach home, far away in Texas. My mother grew up in Texas, in the Rio Grande Valley on an orange orchard, but I've never been there. It's just someplace far away, like Washington, DC.

And I didn't understand emotions, anyway. My mother seemed to have a lot of them, and they seemed to cause her a lot of problems, so I didn't want to have a lot to do with them. I didn't actually think that in 1963; these are things I think about now.

Now I'm 55, and I have been in a profound process of emotional healing for the last several years. I'll spare you the details, but those emotions I didn't want to be in touch with? Let's just say that they have decided to get in touch with me.

So when I awoke this morning to the news of Ted Kennedy's death, a wave of feeling, a wave that has been waiting offshore for its time for so many years, a great wave washed over me and through me. As the wave broke upon me, instead of sea foam and flotsam there was John, and Bobby, and Martin, and riots, and burning... ...and John... and I cry for John, for all of them, for all of us.

And it's okay. That's the big news for me these days. All these feelings are okay. They are filled with priceless information about me and my place in the world. And while some emotions are painful, the pain simply moves through me, like a thunderstorm moves through a town. The storm comes, it rages, and when it leaves everything is fresher and nicer. For me this is big news, and it's good news.

Please join me in saying a prayer for Ted Kennedy, for everyone in his tragic family, and for all of us, everywhere. May you find a deep and abiding peace that glows from within. Amen.

Do you remember John Kennedy's death, or any of the '60's? Do you have any thoughts or feelings about what happened then, or about Ted Kennedy? I'd love to hear from you.