We had a small group around the big table on the evening of June 4. My son Joe had called to ask if we wanted to have dinner together, and I decided to make his favorite meal, a pasty (rhymes with nasty, but it's not!). A pasty is a meat turnover from Cornwall that was a favorite of miners in my hometown of Butte, Montana. Hard-working men carried them in their lunch buckets as they descended into the deep levels of the mines. They were a hearty meal: a fatty pastry crust filled with meat, potatoes, onions, and any combination of root vegetables, depending on availability and the nationality of the one baking the pasties.
My son John refuses to eat pasties, but Joe loves them. It is always his request for a birthday meal. As often happens with 20 somethings, we won't be together on the night of his upcoming 23rd birthday, so I was glad that we could share the special meal, and I was pretty happy that I felt up to preparing the labor intensive meal. It was also his request that I should invite Aunt J, also known as my sister Jeanette.
When we sat down to eat, Jeanette told us a story. June 4th happens to be the anniversary of her graduation from high school. It had been a very rough year for this class and the country. A strike at the mines had lasted for more than 8 months. Many of the large, Catholic families had been plunged into poverty as they fought for safer work conditions and better wages. Martin Luther King was assassinated in April. A war raged in Viet Nam, and the young men wondered if they would be among those sent to Southeast Asia to fight. Bobby Kennedy was running for president five years after his brother had been assassinated. The year was 1968.
After commencement, a supper club in Butte closed to the public so that the kids could safely enjoy their last night together as a class. Jeanette said that in the middle of the party, one of their classmates came into the room and screamed, "They shot Bobby!" On the night of their graduation, when they should have been able to celebrate, the unthinkable happened.
My sister said that people started crying. The party immediately turned to mourning. Some ended up spending the rest of the night at a church, pleading for his survival, and asking for grace for his young family as well as all the Kennedys.
Joe and his girlfriend Katie asked thoughtful questions about that night, and the implications for our country. I told them that when I was a freshman in 1966, on an October day with unusually clear blue skies, I had walked from school to the courthouse where Bobby Kennedy talked to the people of Butte. Bobby was our hero, and embodied hope for our future. We didn't understand very much about the differences between Republicans and Democrats. Our young hearts had hope because he was the champion of the poor.
Less than two years later, he was gone. Jeanette said that the main reason she brought up the 40 year-old incident was that she wanted them to understand why it's such a big deal that so many people are participating in the primary process this year. The Party had not recovered after the youthful exuberance of the Kennedys was snuffed out. Until now, that is. Jeanette said that every Democrat should be proud of the new life that's been breathed into the process lately.
Our conversation sparked many memories about those years: a time when Butte played an important part national politics. I remembered when President Kennedy came to town, and we made welcome signs to hold as we lined the motorcade route just a few blocks from our house. And I'll never forget the sight of Bobby, his sandy-colored shock of thick hair sillouetted against the sky.
I consider myself more of an independent these days. But I am pretty excited about the possibilities of the impending election. More than anything, I'm hoping that the candidates remain healthy and safe so that the winner can try to keep his, yes his, promises in January.