Musings on Turning 51.

The years are flying by so quickly now that it's frightening. It's kind of like being in some kind of time-warp where no matter now badly you want to slow time down, it speeds up on its' own to the point where you can hardly catch your breath.

Then there's the spirit-body disconnect that none of you will understand or appreciate until you reach your silver-haired years... inside I feel like the same tentative, nervous kid just starting yet another new school... full of wonder, dreams for the future, and adventure... and yet physically my body is simply wearing out. Things are starting to break down, and my health isn't what it used to be. I guess that's the sick cosmic joke of aging... feeling young inside while your body crumbles to dust around you.

The upside is that I have had the opportunity to have a front-row seat for some of the most significant events of our age.

I remember the day that JFK was shot and killed. I remember watching the tape of that horrible event play over, and over, and over... and the gut-wrenching announcement by Walter Cronkite that the president was dead. I remember reliving the horror when his brother Robert was killed.

I remember Charles Manson. And Son of Sam. And the Boston Strangler. The High-Fi Murderers. Gary Gilmore. Arthur Gary Bishop. Ted Bundy. And John Wayne Gacy. I actually met the High-Fi murderers and Arthur Gary Bishop when I worked at the prison. Look them up. They terrified a generation.

I remember my grandparents... which none of you probably even had the chance to meet. They were the most wonderful grandparents you could have imagined... doting, loving, and affectionate. Salt-of-the-earth people. I truly wish you could have had the opportunity to know them as I did. They didn't have much, but to a little boy, it was all that I could have ever asked for.

I remember Captain Kangaroo. And Buffalo Bob. And Howdy Doody. And Mighty Mouse. And Bozo the Clown. And Soupy Sales. And Casper the Friendly Ghost. And Felix the Cat. I remember Ovaltine and Magic Decoder Rings. Jack LaLane. And Art Linkletter. If you really want to know what life was like when I grew up, rent "A Christmas Story." I was Ralphie. His school could have been my school.

I remember the 60's. Quite a feat, when you consider that most who lived during that decade DON'T. LOLOLOL!!!!! Oh, my gosh.. bell-bottoms, tie-dyed everything, sheepskin vests, ruffled shirts, and medallions... permed hair... the whole bit. It was quite the experience. I remember when the Beatles landed in America. :) I remember the special assemblies on the dangers of drugs. I remember peace signs, and "groovy," and "far out."

I remember the Viet Nam war. The protests. The demonstrations. I remember watching Lyndon B. Johnson on TV, and thinking that he looked a LOT like my grandpa. And he did. They could have been brothers.

I remember Kent State. I participated in a debate on that horrible event while in 7th grade in Slippery Rock. Can't remember which side I was on... just remember the impact that those images had on my impressionable mind.

I remember Martin Luther King... I remember watching his "I have a Dream" speech on TV. I remember the day he died... and the outrage I felt.

I remember George Wallace, and the day HE was shot. And the racism he represented... when racism was still a very visible norm in much of the South.

I remember Richard Nixon. I watched Watergate unfold before me in the newspapers and TV... and watched that fateful broadcast when Nixon resigned office... a first in this nation.

I remember the Cold War. I remember "nuclear drills" and the cheesy educational films they made us watch in elementary school. As if getting under our desks would help. I remember bomb bunkers and public bomb shelters.

I remember when TV was only black and white. Our first TV was a 12" black and white whose channel changer never seemed to work, and which received only 3 channels... on a good day. I remember having to hang tinfoil on the rabbit ears to get better reception. I remember Laugh-In. And the Smothers Brothers. And Mission Impossible. And Perry Mason. I remember Jack Benny, George Burns, and Bob Hope. Jerry Lewis and Dean Martin. And my beloved Red Skelton. And I remember Ed Sullivan. And Elvis.

I remember when home video came out. And Betamax. I remember when "special effects" meant a cheesy model hanging by a string, and stop-action clay "monsters." I remember test patterns, and the national anthem when the broadcast day was done. I remember TV before cable... before satellite... and before infomercials.

I remember AM radio, when it was THE thing... and was the only kind of radio that cars had. I remember Wolfman Jack. I remember transister radios. 8-track tapes. Then cassette tapes. Sony Walkmans. And finally CD's.

I remembers cars without seat belts.

I remember party lines. It's a telephone thing. Ask mom. :) I remember telephones before 10-key pads came out... when all we had was a round dial.

I remember when doctors made house calls.

I remember 45's, 33's, and even 78's. I had my own record player, and a box to hold my records. My first album was The Vogues. Granny bought it for me at Penny's... when they still had a candy counter. :) I remember candy fruit slices.

I sold donuts door-to-door when I was 9. I had a paper route when I was 12... when the biggest thrill in town was... the roller rink on Friday nights.

I remember watching with awe as dad sang opera... in a tux... in his faculty performances at Slippery Rock State.

I remember dad before he was dad.

I remember life before the 3-hour block at Church. I remember driving with dad 30 miles each way to Priesthood Meeting... coming home, going back for Sunday School, looking forward to going home with my friends from Church to play between meetings.. and then coming back for Sacrament Meeting late in the afternoon.

I grew up without computers of any kind. And my childhood was still full of wonder, adventure, and exploration... and music. By the time my music education died down to a dull roar, I had played 7 different instruments, and would go on to sing professionally in musical theater by the time I was 19.

I remember dime stores. I remember Woolworths, and their lunch counter. I remember soda jerks and Cherry Fizzes. I remember the corner newsstand and penny candy. I remember volunteer fire departments, and the haunting sound those loud sirens made in stillness of the middle of the night, back before pagers had ever been invented.

I remember working at McDonalds when the Big Mac was introduced, and orders were taken on paper forms.

I remember when the town undertaker also ran the town ambulance. I used to get in trouble by sneaking into the garage where they kept it, and turning on the lights... even then it had a mezmerizing hold on me. :)

I remember Stingray bikes with banana seats. Later, I would rely on 10-speeds as my primary form of transportation. I never owned my own car until I got married the first time. The first car I ever drove was our VW bus.

I remember when gas was 24 cents a gallon, and it was cheaper to drive and camp out all summer than to pay rent. So we did.

I would be in my mid-20's before any kind of desktop computer would be available... and that was an Apple II and a 64k Commodore PET. I was 26 or so when the first PC, running DOS, was released. At the time, I was a "mainframe" programmer... I worked on IBM mainframe computers that required 1600 sq. ft. of floor space in a special environmentally-controlled room... that had the computing power of my current iPhone.

I remember when computer programs were written on "punch cards.." actual, physical cards that had holes punched in them that had to be "read" by a special machine... each card being one instruction in a computer program. Get them out of sequence, and you were screwed. I remember walking across the BYU campus as a kid, and seeing a co-ed carrying a huge stack of cards down the hall of the "computer science" building... and then dropping them... thousands of cards, all over the floor... and seeing her break down in tears at the implications of that... the hours that it would take to put that stack of cards back in the right order. It took weeks to write a simple program. Then, the cards had to be dropped off to be "run." The computer (a mainframe), would "run" the job, and produce a paper printout. That's how they knew (days after they submitted it) if it ran successfully or not. My, have we come a long way!

I remember my best friend at the time, a real geek, taking me to a computer "lab" where one of the BYU professors had done the unthinkable.. had taken a "mini-computer" (the size of an entire floor-to-ceiling wall of kitchen cabinets), and had written a program that made the computer "play" an big 'ole pipe organ in the lab... wow, was that heady stuff! :)

I remember John Glenn, and the historic Mercury flight he took. And then the Gemini missions. And then the Apollo missions. I remember the tragedy of Apollo 1... and the drama of Apollo 13. I remember the shadowy black and white images of Neil Armstrong's "one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind." And I remember the exact spot I was standing in when I heard about Challenger.

I remember the Berlin Wall coming down... and the demise of Communist Russia. I remember the miracle of the temple going up in East Germany BEFORE the wall came down.

I've been alive during the tenure of 11 different U.S. Presidents.

I've watched the passing of 7 different prophets and scores of apostles. I remember David O. McKay... and actually met him, and shook his hand when I was 11. He died shortly thereafer. I met Bruce R. McConkie in person when he and his wife stopped into the fast-food restaurant that I was a manager of one time... on a Sunday afternoon... as they were going from one stake conference to the next. Also N. Eldon Tanner, Mark E. Peterson, Marvin J. Ashton, Dallin H. Oaks, and several other apostles through the years. They all amazed me with their humility, their strength of character, and the Spirit that emanated from them. I've watched the number of temples in the Church go from a handful to over a hundred. I've seen the membership of the Church go from just over 2 million, to over 13 million today... from being a curious little "cult," to being the 4th largest Christian denomination in America... and the 9th largest religious body in the world... and the 4th largest international religious body. There are as many members of the Church worldwide today as there are Jews. Look it up.

I remember when the Priesthood Revelation was received. I was on my mission at the time. Words can't express how excited I was when we heard the news. We wound up baptizing several black families before I came home.

Speaking of missions, I remember when all we had were slides... and filmstrips. And bicycles.

It's a bit awe-inspiring to think of how much of the history of the world I've had the chance to witness in my 51 years so far... and it's easy to forget that almost none of you were around during most of it... or were too young to remember it if you were. So I thought I'd share. :)