Or you could just call it getting old.
Here’s an example: I’ve been telling a story for years about
a former newspaper editor getting into an argument with an advertising manager
about what constituted “news” and what didn’t. I even wrote about the incident
in my book, Time Capsule. But back in
April, when I attended a reunion of former employees of said newspaper, the
editor said he didn’t recall ever having such an argument. Now I don’t know if
it actually happened or not.
(To be fair, however, that same editor mis-remembered the
time I met Art Garfunkel walking down a road in Western
Maryland as part of his famous “walk across America,” so I had to set him
straight about that event. Turnabout is fair play in the mis-remembering game,
I guess.)
Which brings me to the moon walk on July 20, 1969.
First off, let me explain that in the year 1969, I was
working at the Sears store in Fairmont’s new Middletown Mall. (At least I think
I was. Hell, who even knows?) I was there because I had managed to make a total
mess of my first two years of college at Fairmont State University, where I had
enrolled in the first summer session of 1967. Someone had suggested that summer
school was a good place to get acclimated to college life, and like an idiot I
believed him. Silly me. I was only two or three weeks out of high school and absolutely
not ready for college, and I went out of my way to prove it in every conceivable
way.
I’ll spare you the gory details of my early college
experience, except to tell you that over the next two years I managed to meet a
girl, join a fraternity, skip classes, play cards in the student center, go to
parties, drink a lot, hang out at the neighborhood bar watching “Jeopardy” and see
my grade point average decline every semester from 3.0 to 2.3 to 1.5 to 0.8 and
eventually to 0.0.
(Yes, there is
such a thing as a 0.0 GPA. I have the papers to prove it.)
At that point, the college politely asked me to leave and
not come back for one full year, so I was placed on academic probation. I also
managed to get drafted into the military, fail my physical (not because of bone
spurs) and go to work at Sears, a brand new store which wasn’t even open yet. I
worked in the warehouse, checking and labeling products to be stocked on store
shelves prior to grand opening.
So it was that, according to my best memory, I was working
on the night of July 20, 1969, when Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin became the
first humans from planet earth to walk on the surface of the moon. Except that
I wasn’t. I remember coming out from the warehouse to watch the moon landing that
was showing on every TV set in Sears’ television department. Except that I didn’t.
And I remember standing in an aisle and watching Neil Armstrong take one giant
leap for mankind. Except that I didn’t do that, either.
You see, contrary to what I thought I remembered, July 20,
1969, was a Sunday, and I don’t believe I ever worked at Sears on Sunday nights.
In addition, the moon landing occurred at 4:17 p.m. and 40 seconds on the
afternoon of July 20, and not at night as I remember it, so even if I had been
working, it didn’t happen when I thought it did. Further, Armstrong didn’t step
off the ladder of the lunar module and touch the moon’s surface until six and a
half hours after the Eagle had landed, so his moon walk began at 10:56 p.m.,
Eastern Daylight Time. Regardless of the day of the week, I can assure you I
was not working in the Sears warehouse as late as 11 p.m.
So why do I remember all of that happening? Why does it seem
so clear? Why have I been telling people what I obviously mis-remembered for the
past 50 years? Did I just watch a replay of the event? It sure seemed like I
was watching it in real time. I have these questions and more. I just don’t
have any answers. I don’t know why the mind conjures up images of things that
didn’t happen and we convince ourselves they are true. If anybody does know the
answer, I’d love to hear it. Meanwhile, it makes me wonder how many other
events I have mis-remembered over the years, such as:
* Where I was when John F. Kennedy was assassinated (I think
it was the freshman building at Fairmont Senior High School),
* Where I first heard the Sergeant Pepper’s album (seems like
it was a parking lot in downtown Fairmont),
* The first girl I kissed (I see us under the porch on the White
School playground) and
* Who she was (the name Mary is lodged in my brain).
And that’s just for starters.
For the record, I do remember getting married, my children
being born, my first newspaper job and the three that came after that, retiring
from the power company and writing four books. I remember all of my dogs and our
four cats, every house we bought and every place we lived. I remember playing
softball and being the drummer in a rock and roll band. I remember vacations at
the beach and Christmases with the family. I remember my grandchildren, my
parents and all of my closest friends. I guess that means I remember the things
that are truly important in my life.
But the Apollo 11 moon landing and Neil Armstrong’s historic
jump off the lunar module’s ladder? I could have sworn I remembered that, too.
Now, about the Beatles on Ed Sullivan, the 1979 World Series and that whole Watergate
thing…
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