8 -A Look at a Day, January 22, 1964–1969
I shared a small snippet of my diary entry in the previous post 1963/1964 Small Town GA Happenings.
It might be interesting to look at January 22 across several years in the life of a child going from age 11 to the age of 16; so allow me to share on a more personal note what my experiences were verbatim as I recorded them. I do admit that part of my motivation comes from January 22, 1968 being a date that made its mark on me to last a lifetime. I chose today, because even 48 years later the impact is still there. I’ve included pictures from ‘64-’69 just catching the continuity of life.
January 22, 1964: (age 11, 6th grade) “Dear Diary, Today President Kennedy has been dead for two months. It’s a Wednesday night. We just got back home from a trip to Columbus where we ate supper. We are planning to call Bubba tonight.” [my pet name for my brother Adrian] He was away at military school at age 14.
January 22, 1965: (age 12, 7th grade) “I stayed home from school today, because I’ve been very sick — cough, cold, fever. Ugh! Just feel awful. Laurie came down after school and brought me my assignments. Three more of my friends, Debby, Diane and Brownie also missed school because of being sick.”
January 22, 1966: (age 13, 8th grade) “I went to see Dr. Pugh this morning. I got the dreaded shot of penicillin. God, how I hate getting shots. My throat is on fire. An aunt from Nashville called tonight to say she and my uncle will not be coming as planned because of snow.”
Interestingly, I began writing a little more, quantity-wise. Guess that makes sense at 14! That five year diary was quickly modified to a four year diary!
January 22, 1967: (age 14, 9th grade)“Bubba, my dad and I went to church this morning. My mom had been at Sunday school, but came home early to start Sunday dinner makings. It has been such a warm day for January. We went on an afternoon drive — just around the county — country roads, some dirt, some paved. It was fun since car time allows for a lot of fun family talk. Dad reminded us that six movie films had arrived in the mail on Saturday and we spent the early evening with relatives watching our home movies.
January 22, 1968: (age 15, 10th grade) “Today has truly been an extremely difficult day for all of us. This is one day that I can say I wish had never come. Mama was operated on at 10:00 AM this morning by Dr. Graff in Columbus. My dad and I arrived in time to see her for a few minutes before the surgery. The results were very alarming. The doctor told us they found a malignant tumor. Oh no, this cannot be happening. Please not Mama. The doctor said that with treatments she would perhaps have a longer chance. How I pray this is so. My dad drove me back home and dropped me with an aunt and he went back up for the night. Oh God, I wish this were all a bad dream, but I know I’ve got to face the fact that it is very real.
January 22, 1969: (age 16, 11th grade) “This is a day that painfully stands out in my life. My mom started her fight against cancer this day last year. The next several months felt disastrously painful for all of us. I wonder even now if the emptiness and loneliness will ever go away. Will this pain in my heart ever heal and will the pain ever be eased? I’m so glad I had a day off from school yesterday, because of Parent-Teacher conferences. I went back to school today, but I could not do much except think about our experiences last year constantly throughout the day. Most classes just went on as regular. Some vocational counselor from Americus came and talked to the juniors about opportunities from a perspective different from ‘going to college.’ It’s been a miserable, rainy, damp, cold day and that’s how this day will always be in my mind. After school my dad and I took it easy. We ate supper at June’s cafe. Then we took a drive up to Columbus just to get away for a little while.”
Grief, I’ve experienced it a number of times over the course of my 60-something years. I’m grateful that as time went by, I gained an ability to talk about my mom again and to share the joy that we shared during the time we did walk the planet together.
I am filled with love, gratitude, and thankfulness for all the things she gave me. When I became a mom, I felt her presence evermore strongly once again in my life. What I recall about being 16 and 17 and trying to deal with the loss of a parent, was that I also had such a challenge even just trying to talk about her with my friends. I would well up in tears and just could not even utter much of anything with any coherence. That was most frustrating.
She was so important to me and I cherished our relationship so much. Not to be able to share my mom with new friends as I went off to college in 1970 felt like I had lost a piece of myself. The ability to share her with others did return for me as I continued my trek through college. She was such a light in my world and that light still shines strongly to this very day.
