A memory not forgotten.

Looking back on my half century life (so far to date and counting !) I got to thinking just how far back could I actually remember. After digging deep I can say my earliest memory, albeit a bit vague, was from 1963, sitting on my dad's shoulders by the side of the old Dublin airport road winding it's way into the city, otherwise known these days as the R132. Irish people never really use formalities such as lettering and numbering of motorways or national routes, we tend to call them by the name of where they finally end up ! Such examples are ...the M1 (the new Belfast/Dublin road or the N3..... the Galway road, ... you get the idea. Anyway,I digress.....
I was a happy go lucky little three year old sitting on my dad's shoulders waiting to get a glimpse of J.F K passing by with his entourage on their way firstly to Dublin City, and later to his ancesteral home in Wexford. It wasn't long after his return to the USA and Dallas he was assissanated. It was good to see him alive and well on that day in '63. We all waved as they rolled by in their big open-top cars and he gave a smile and a wave as he looked my way over the top of crowds of people lining the pavement to get a glimpse of him and his wife. Did he smile and wave at just me that day ?... it seemed that way and I always like to think he did. Mind you, standing on that wall in Santry many years later John Paul II did the same waving bit to me as JFK had done on his way past me many years before on the old road into Dublin City from the Airport !. He too took a bullet from an assissan a while later, but he survived ! So these days if people ask me did I see the queen or Obama I say...don't ask ! I don't want to tempt fate !!

Best Paulie ..