Innocence
Sarah listened to his acceptance speech at the convention
and thought it was the best she’d heard. She followed the campaign closely and
was struck by his ready wit and his grace under pressure. And of course, she
thought he won the debates hands down.
None of this prepared her for his inaugural address. When he said “…
the torch has been passed to a new generation of Americans …” she knew he was
speaking to her. When he said “… ask not what your country can do for you, ask
what you can do for your country…” she felt the goose bumps break out all over.
In November of 1963, Sarah was a Peace Corps volunteer working in a
remote village in Kenya when she heard the news from Dallas. Until that day,
she believed with all her heart that her generation would change the world and
make it better, and she fought hard to hold onto that belief. Then came the war
in Vietnam, and the burning ghettos at home, and the violent anti-war protests,
and more assassinations. First, Martin was shot dead, and then Bobby. The
decade that began with such promise now had a single, enduring icon: a body
bag.
Sarah came home and married well
and settled into her life as a wife, mother, and schoolteacher. She was
thrilled by the bright and eager faces and the boundless energy that filled her
classroom every day. Her station wagon was always loaded with kids, carpooling
from one event to another. It was a full and busy life.
But in the quiet times, alone with her thoughts, she felt despair
settle in like a fifty-pound weight on her chest. Her despair was for the
children and their future. Her belief in a better world died, finally, with
Bobby Kennedy on the kitchen floor of the Ambassador Hotel in 1968.
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