The Sixties

CNN has a new multi-part documentary out called "The Sixties".  One of their subtitles is "the decade that shaped America". It's true - there has been no more challenging, explosive, strange, dynamic, angst-filled or life-altering time in American history. I say this without hesitation and with absolute certainty.

I have not watched the series.

I do not feel the need to relive this time because the events themselves are etched indelibly in my mind like a colorful tattoo that has not faded with the years.  From watching the Nixon-Kennedy debates in 1960 as a ten year old to my wedding day in 1969, I remember every year, every political rally and assassination, every march for civil rights, every song on the radio, every TV show and every horrific vision of war shown nightly on our black and white TVs.  I remember my first kiss and hearing of President Kennedy's murder. I remember the Beatles on Ed Sullivan and the Six Day War and the 1968 riot in Chicago at the Democratic National Convention.

When I look back on The Sixties, I see the legacy of my generation. I am proud of my contemporaries for protesting and resisting a war that shed over 50,000 American lives for (let's admit it) absolutely nothing, for assuring equal rights for people of color and minorities, for challenging laws that prohibited inter-racial marriage and for eliminating back-room abortions. We Boomers made a positive difference and truly "shaped America". And the Sixties shaped me as well...

Groovy!

;-)