Neil Armstrong died this week at the age of 82. On July 20, 1969, Neil became famous for
uttering his famous words, “That’s one small step for man…one giant leap for
mankind”. His fellow astronaut, Buzz
Aldrin, followed shortly thereafter and together they became the first two
people to walk on the face of any heavenly body outside of the planet
earth. That’s some pretty cool
juju!
I had just turned 10-years old less than 2-weeks before man’s
first walk on the moon. I lived with my
family in Marshall, Arkansas and remember how excited I was to get a small
reel-to-reel audio tape recorder for my birthday that year.
And so on the evening of July 20th, I sat with my
family in the living room of our home to watch a grainy black and white picture
of shadows coming down the ladder of the lunar lander. With the awestruck mind of a young boy, I sat
on our hardwood floors with my little tape recorder running and recorded the
moon landing and those famous words LIVE from the television broadcast.
It was a time of hope and excitement at the end of a
tumultuous decade punctuated by the assassinations of President John F.
Kennedy, Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., and Robert Kennedy. The unpopular war in Vietnam was splashed
across that same television every night as we would listen to the latest body
count of American soldiers by news reporter Walter Cronkite. Protests across the nation, racial divides and
increased rhetoric by the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. in the midst of the Cold War
seemed to be the only thing anyone regularly discussed.
As adults, we sometimes think that the little kids don’t
really understand nor have an appreciation for what is going on in our
world. “Adult topics”….we call
them. And while the boys played with
their trucks and girls played with their dolls, Mom and Dad didn’t give the
impact on our young ears much thought.
In 1969, at the age of 10, I was keenly aware of world
events. Maybe that is unusual for a kid,
but for me it was normal. My brother was
19-years old. I used to be scared that
he would get drafted into the Army and sent to Vietnam and die. My sister was 17-years old and used to talk
about her high school friends who were going into the military and would
eventually be sent to Vietnam. Some of
their classmates did indeed go…and some came home in body bags. I was also scared that someday I would also
have to go to Vietnam…and die.
That’s a pretty heavy thing for a 10-year old boy to be
thinking about. I never told anyone my
thoughts.
Dad took me on a visit to California around that time in my
life…just the two of us. It was a
magical trip that I never forgot and always cherished. We visited San Francisco and a very famous
area of those days….Haight-Ashbury. It
was the center of the counter-culture world full of hippies, crazy music, colorful
clothes and peace signs everywhere.
Again, it made an impression on my young mind. I asked for, and received, a set of bongos for
Christmas that year.
The experiences of our childhood have lasting impressions on
the rest of our lives. Try to make sure
your kids are experiencing the best that life has to offer. And when difficult events happen in our
world, take the time to sit down and talk with them about it and their
feelings. Trust me…they are paying
attention.
Papa Chief
