Today’s blog
Lynn Murphy Mark
1949 was a good year
Last night we went to a local brewery/restaurant for dinner and entertainment. Entertainment consisted of a country western icon here in the Southwest – Texas and New Mexico anyway. Sheila and Barrett both knew of the performer, an elderly man named Bill Hearne. When I say elderly, I mean he looks older than his age, which happens to be Sheila’s and mine: born in 1949. That puts him in his relatively early 70’s. Both Sheila and I will turn 74 before 2023 is over and done with.
Anyway, he is stooped over, needed help getting up two steps, and took his time settling into a chair. A couple of technicians worked with him to get exactly the electronic settings that he wanted. His fingers flew across the frets of his guitar as he checked the volume and the amount of bass. The two guys that would play with him were quietly checking their instruments. There was another guitar player and a bass fiddler.
It was fun watching them get ready to play for the crowd. Most of us were there for dinner and a couple of beers. I was enjoying something called “African Queen Pale Ale”. I don’t know much about beer, but I do know when one tastes good, and this one did not disappoint. Soon, eight o’clock rolled around and the music started. Not two beats into the first song and there were couples dancing to the rhythm. Most of them looked like this was not their first rodeo, as they twirled and glided across the floor. I was equally entertained by the music and by watching the dancers.
Back to 1949. Bill Hearne may look 80 but he plays like a youngster. He’s been playing most of his life, so that’s a lot of picking and singing. He was born in Texas, nearly blind in one eye due to rare childhood cataracts. Sheila and I read about him on our phones and discovered that we shared the year of our birth with this talented man. I told Sheila that another 49-er happens to be Meryl Streep, who turned 74 on June 22. I know this because I absolutely adore and admire her, and I think I’ve seen every movie she ever made.
1949 also ushered in Billy Joel, Bruce Springsteen, Elizabeth Warren and George Foreman, to name just a few. In January of this year Harry S. Truman was sworn in as the President of the USA, while in the Middle East, Chaim Weizmann became the first-ever President of Israel. The first non-stop flight around the world happened. In England, astronomer Fred Hoyle coined the term “Big Bang”. On the world stage, NATO was signed into being. Eire is renamed the Republic of Ireland, and leaves the British Commonwealth and the Federal Republic of Germany is established.
In New York City my newbie parents prepared for a transfer to General Motors offices in Mexico City. I’m told that I was about 6 weeks old when they boarded what was likely a Pan American Airlines flight to the “Distrito Federal” which is how one refers to Mexico City. There is an ancient passport photo of my mom holding me for our first joint passport. For twelve years we lived in Mexico City when the air was clean to breathe. We were not too far removed from the two famous volcanoes, Popocatepetl and Iztaccihuatl that sit about 43 miles from Mexico City. One is a single cone, and it is named after a famous warrior, Popcatepetl. Right next to him is what looks like the silhouette of a sleeping woman, believed to have been a princess, deeply in love with the warrior.
Popo is not dormant, despite the fact that every year, villagers trek to the 18,000 foot top with offerings of food and flowers to placate him. Actually in May of this year he started sending up plumes of smoke and ash, and minor earthquakes have been recorded in the area. Video feeds show glowing hot rocks blowing from the peak. Should there ever be a major eruption, 24 million people are at risk. I checked to see if anything significant had happened with Popo in 1949, but apparently that was a quiet year for him.
So much for my 1949 tangent. These days when I’m asked for the year of my birth I have to scroll down through 7 decades. That’s a lot of water under this old bridge!