Reelin' in the Years

"Nostalgia is a corrupting emotion."

How much do we remember of our lives and how much do we invent? As Ann Althouse points out in her post, Oskar Eustis was 8 years old during the Summer of Love, so he's more likely remembering it wholesale, although watching an attempt to levitate the Pentagon would probably stick in the memory banks. But is it true that "what really imprints on you is what was happening when you were 17"?

Now I can honestly put a lie to Robin Williams' famous dictum ("If you remember the 60's, you weren't there"); I lived through the 60's - going from 7 to 17 - and I do remember them. Of course, I remember them the way anyone remembers an era 40 years gone; in bits and pieces and mostly in the form of personal anecdotes.

Like all kids, I went through a lot of changes during that decade and, like most boys, those changes primarily involved girls and sports. The political events of the 60's, with a few exceptions, were a blur to me and the notion of trying to stop a war - even a war that I would almost participate in a few years later - never blipped on my radar screen. The Kennedy assassination in '63 may have scarred my psyche but the arrival of my new best friend Mr. Boner the following year had a much greater effect on my day to day life.

Now, in fairness to Mr. Eustis, I can remember two things (that I'm reasonably sure I'm not, you know, inventing) that happened in my life before the age of 8 which have had a much more lasting imprint than anything that happened when I was 17. So, perhaps if the event is traumatic enough - Look, son! The Pentagon is wobbling! It's starting to rise! - maybe it can leave a lasting imprint. Or perhaps not.

Anyway, the only thing that left a lasting imprint on me when I was 17 - other than graduating high school - was that the Beatles broke up.

And I'm sure not nostalgic about that.