There has been a lot of talk lately
about people asking others if they remember our country’s Bicentennial.
For reference, on the back of the
above picture there is a notation in my handwriting that says, “Bicentennial ‘76”.
Additionally, that’s me front and center.
So, do I remember the Bicentennial?
Boy, do I remember that weekend!
Though my telling of that weekend
needs to start a few weeks back.
As you can see from the above picture,
I was in band, and I played the B-flat clarinet.
And clearly my memories of that
historic weekend start with being in the summer band class.
Most particularly, I was in the
6th grade summer band class, as that was the year of school I just
finished. I was also the shortest person in my section, which I probably could
have tolerated if my fellow classmates hadn’t decided to make a big deal of
it.
It didn’t help that I had not yet
learned how to keep my mouth shut, and lying isn’t in me.
(It seems I’m on the spectrum, go figure.)
At any rate, when one of them pointed
out I was the shortest in class, I had honestly informed them, “Yeah, and I’m
the oldest.”
It was the first day of class, so
they wondered how I could be so sure. I basically told them I was behind
in school; I was 13 and would be 14 in about a month. All true.
And I should have kept my mouth
shut. But it got worse a few weeks later when one of the girls expressed the
opinion that maybe someone had forgotten to give me a pinch to grow an inch on
my last birthday.
Being honest, and still not knowing how
to keep my mouth shut, I let them know I hadn’t received any birthday spanking,
and that requisite pinch, since like I was 10.
That was by far one of the biggest
mistakes I’d ever made, and it was most unfortunate that I’d already told them,
way back when I told them how old I was, exactly when my birthday was.
Yikes! The next thing I knew, all 13
or so of my female classmates were conspiring to overpower me and administer my
birthday spanking and that badly needed pinch on my coming birthday, which,
quite unfortunately, fell on a day when we were scheduled for class.
I was not looking forward to this
event. After all, these girls outnumbered me and were bigger than me.
Ergo, while we were marching through
town on Saturday, July 3rd, 1976, my mind was more on whether or not
I should ditch class on Monday.
And thereby what happened when we
reached the end of this parade is forever etched into my memory, because for
me, it was epic.
Here is the gist of what happened. As
we reached the ending point, our band leader faced all of us and informed us
that, owing to the momentous holiday falling on a Sunday, class was cancelled
for Monday.
Now, as we were school kids, you
would think we all cheered, but owing to the plans of the majority of the
clarinet section, our band leader ended up staring at us in stunned silence.
I might point out that the one boy
in our section, had no reaction at all and all but one of the girls in our section
(almost in unison) snapped their fingers, stomped their foot, and said, “Oh,
shoot!” while the lone remaining girl all but collapsed to the ground with her
hand on her chest and breathed a very heartfelt, “Oh, thank God!”
That isn’t to say that I do not
remember the rest of that weekend because I do.
At one point on Sunday the 4th,
my siblings and I played with sparklers in our yard; then we went with our
mother to watch the fireworks display. Afterwards, because of traffic, it took us so
long to get home that by the time we entered our house, it was already July 5th.
Konnie and I pointed out it was now officially our birthday and demanded our
presents.
I do not remember what Konnie got,
but I do remember I got the Barbie Dreamboat. I actually still have it.
And later that day we packed up a
picnic, along with our cake and ice cream, and went to Ross Park to continue
our celebration. Which is where someone saw our birthday cake and said they
thought it was a cool idea to have a cake for our county’s birthday.
I guess she was thinking about America’s
birthday because that day there was a festival in that very park as part of the
Bicentennial festivities.
Anyway, happy writing, everyone!
