17 | June | 2010 | Earful of Cider

I’m forty years old today.I remember writing to President Ford in Kindergarten. I wore red plaid pants and a brown denim jacket with brass, pooh-bear buttons to first-grade. I had a metal Bionic Woman lunchbox.

I remember Mt. St. Helen’s erupting.

I remember sitting in the front seat, no seatbelts, when I was five years old—in the summer, the melting vinyl seats bonded me into place anyway. My mother would leave us kids in the car while she ran into the grocery to do errands—the windows were rolled down because it never crossed her mind that we might be gone when she returned. And I remember when all that gradually changed.

I remember home computers running on cassette tapes and floppies (both sizes). I remember the advent and decline of 8-tracks, cassette tapes, Betamax, polaroid cameras, and Atari. I’m working on VHS.

I read Hitchhicker’s Guide to the Galaxy in seventh grade. Forever, too. This may explain a few things.

I wore my sunglasses at night when I was sixteen. Big, plastic mismatched earrings, too.

I remember when MTV played music videos.

I graduated high school the year before they installed metal detectors.

I got married and stayed married. I gave birth to two beautiful daughters.

I wrote two complete (if unpublished) novels and more than a few shipwrecks that may sail someday. One or two of my articles have been cited in college term papers and National History Day projects.

I predate the Internet. And the computer mouse. And icons. And cable. I predate ‘dude,’ Dude.

I predate Sesame Street. Sometimes good things last.

The first forty years have been interesting—the next sixty should rock.