Birth Date
Introduction
Bob skimmed a newspaper from
the day he was born. Since no single
article “leaped out” as significant, he combined elements of several to reveal
some of the experiences that led him to return to college after many years.
I. Introductory statement: I read the Oregonian from the day of my birth—November 28, 1952—and I was struck by how much the world has grown right along with me.
II. The news was unspectacular that day—a collage of things, many foreshadowing events yet to come—growing pains, if you will, of a world struggling to figure out how it’s really done.
A. How to live without war and racism.
B. How to know and be ourselves.
C. How to confront the dishonesty of governments to their people and people to themselves.
III. The tantrum of the war was evident.
A. The Korean peace talks had bogged down.
B. Ho Chi Min wanted a truce with France.
C. Americans still gloated in self-satisfaction at having won the “Big One.”
D. The Cold War was chilly indeed.
E. McCarthyism was in full swing.
IV. A front page headline told of a busload of “Negro” soldiers in South Carolina were sentenced to jail and fined $1570 because one of them sat next to a white girl.
A. This article was countered by another headline.
B. It stated the U.S. Attorney General’s call for the end of racial segregation in the public schools.
V. Reading the newspaper also struck me by what was not there.
A. There was nothing about me.
B. It would have been nice to have seen something, you know, nothing much really, maybe a little box in the corner of the front page, “Bob Pettit has arrived.”
C. But no, nothing was mentioned.
D. Nothing that really gave a clue to my future nature—my likes and dislikes, the essence of me.
E. There should have been something about rattlesnakes and saw mills, cab driving and rock and roll, about world travel, alcohol, Alcoholics Anonymous, but there was none of it, these growing pains yet to come, unforeseen.
VI. Conclusion: And this reinforces my belief that in order to grow there must be a place from which to grow; that part of growing up is—well, growing up. And that we all have had the need to let out a whoop and a yell.