This was originally published at Yahoo Voices, and I have also posted it here before. But I was remembering again this week...
It was a gray and chilly day in New York City. I was a senior at the High School of Music and Art, and we had midterms that week. I should explain: because we had the statewide Regents exams at the end of each semester, we had a week of midterm exams written by our teachers some time in the middle, the way other people had finals.
I had two exams that morning. I don't remember what they were, though I think one of them was French. I had taken the subway and then caught the bus across town which left me at the foot of the long staircase through the park that led to the school on St. Nicholas Terrace. I trudged up the steps, feeling the grayness like a weight, until I looked up and saw...
David Iarussi was wearing bright green socks. When I think back to that day before the President was shot, I remember things in shades of gray except for those green socks.
Anyway, I hung out in front of the school, went in and took my tests, and then went home since I was done for the day. I was planning to watch Password at two o'clock. My friend Doreen and I were on the phone before that. I don't remember who called who, but during that call, her older sister came in. She was upset and said something about the President being shot. Doreen told me. We weren't sure we believed it. I went to turn the television on, since it was close to two o'clock anyway, and she turned on the radio.
Of course, Password was not on that day. We stayed on the phone for a while watching and listening as reports came in from the hospital in Dallas that he was dead, then that he was in surgery, then finally again that he was indeed dead.
I kept the television on. My mother came home, and we didn't say much, but watched together. We saw the doctor come out to make the official announcement, we watched the film of the motorcade, cried when we saw Mrs. Kennedy.
What I remember is feeling numb, unable to think about anything. When my mother got up to make supper, I was startled. How could she do anything as ordinary as making supper? She said something about life going on, and remembering when FDR died. It made no sense to me.
I remember a few things from the week-end. I babysat the next night, again surprised that the couple I sat for was still going out, and that I actually could do something so mundane. At some point during the week-end, Leonard Bernstein conducted the New York Philharmonic in the first two movements of the Eroica Symphony while photos of Kennedy were shown on screen. I still cannot hear the Funeral March from the Eroica without thinking of that time.
And the next time Doreen and I were talking on the phone, we watched Jack Ruby shoot Lee Harvey Oswald.
It was a long time before we talked on the phone again.