Muscial Saturday Morning

It was December 1966, thanks to the sassy mouth of one Sargent Shriver, US Ambassador to France - all NATO families were thrown out of France.  My heart throb of the time, Maria Shriver, was to return to the USA and I as a German was to be returned to Germany.  But, events of the times were to transcend personal desires.   The times were evil.  Six of my friends whom lived over the canal from me had been butchered by a crazed mob of French Communists intent upon driving the "US Occupation Forces" from France. We were German, it made no sense to me.

I can remember more than once running for my life from the riots, hiding in dumpsters (even one which got fire bombed!), trying to keep cars between me and those whom sought the blood of the "Vietnam Aggressors".   The rage of the crowds made no sense to me.   I knew some of those people, they were normal, we played checkers on Saturday, fished the canal together, shared salami, cheese and bread (and absinthe! but don't tell my mother).  How could normal people go insane once in a crowd?   How could happenings a world away, in any way, affect my little town on the Flemish-Lux border?  It made no sense to this 5'6", eleven year old...

Evacuated under armed military guard by the French Special Services (whose machine-guns were pointed at me!), my sister and I were originally housed at Kaiserslautern Army Base.  As the miles ticked away in the military convoy to the German border, I pondered the events of the past several months.  I had loved living in Quessy Centre.  The people were not real friendly as a rule but certain ones whom had bothered to know me were.  The local baker for instance, for whom I had interned for my Courdon Bleu chef's rating, thought me gifted.  As did my chef mentor. A nd the local beer hall crowd loved my Brit tourist stories.

And conversely, the horrors I already described above.

Months later, sitting on the bus, being hauled to the Canadian Schools, this song came on the radio and we all sat in silence and listened.  The world was no longer a friendly place we had learned.  Something was wrong, the generation ahead of us were screwing up our world badly.   But, we were powerless, or were we?