The other day my friend Kathryn posed the following question to her Facebook friends for comment and discussion: 

What historical event occurred when you were a child that made an impression on you and why? 

I didn’t participate in the discussion but I did think about the question and was reminded of the Watergate scandal and President Nixon’s subsequent resignation from office.  I was only 8 years old at the time of this event and clueless to the fact that political history was being made.  All I knew was that there was nothing on TV that night. 

I was in the back of the house in the bedroom we had designated as the “toy room” when my friend Lisa, who was staying for dinner that night filled me in on the significance of what was going on and why the president was hogging all four channels of the television.  She told me that we were getting a new president because the old one, Nixon, was a bad man.  The new president was Mr. Ford.  And while it was already clearly established that Lisa, also age 8, was way smarter than me, she did qualify her information with “My dad told me.” 

I responded back with something along the lines of “Good! I hate Nixon.” 

This was my first political discussion.  I’m still annoyed about missing The Waltons.