Monday, August 13, 2007

Circa 1970



I really shouldn't title this post "circa" because I know exactly it is July 1970. My two brothers are on their way to NYC (this use to be they way you boarded a plane!!) to meet up with my Auntie M. and then on their way to Europe for two weeks. One week in Paris, the second in London.

I was to go. I was invited.

I said, "No thanks, I'd rather spend this summer with my friends."

Do I remember a thing from my summer of 1970? Actually I do. It is the summer I went hog wild and ran with Susie. I spent the summer riding around in her black Bug, neither of us with a license. (hence my header, because I loved that Black Beetle and the adventures that went with it).....

Yet, I think I made a big mistake. Looking at this picture I envy those two kids who hold those memories of theatre in London and standing in front of the masterpieces of the Louvre. I wonder if my life would have been changed. I wonder if I would have developed a different perspective of the world. Would I have realized, that summer, that I lived in a small fish bowl and the world was a large ocean with possibilities that boggle my small town mind.

Instead, I insulated myself in the dramas of a 17 year old readying herself to be a senior in High School.

I missed out on the chance of a life time.

I traded it for a handful of memories and experiences that molded my life. It could have been a different set of experiences.

If I had to do it all over again (knowing what I know today) I would be in that picture with my brothers getting ready to board that plane. I would have been the one in a dress...a very short dress.

2 comments:

Lisa :-] said...

What the hell does a seventeen-year-old know? Now or thirty-seven years ago?

There are times, now, that I wish my parents had MADE me do things, rather than giving me a choice...

The Fabulous Kitty Glendower said...

I went to London when I was 17. All of us teenagers stayed up late every night, some drank, played cards, and then slept through all the tours. It was like we never went really. I had to go again as an adult many years later to fully appreciate the experience.