Where Were You When it Happened?

The Armistices of Two World Wars are in the news this time of year and rightly so. There are people who will remember exactly where they were as they were announced, in 1918 and again in 1945. Even the second is not within my memory although I do remember VE Day celebrations quite vividly. Which set me thinking, how many events in life do we remember for whatever reason. Not the everyday events thrown at us on life's long journey, but those unique, special one offs never to be repeated. It would be easy to browse through an almanac of world events but that would be cheating. For if we have to look it up, so to speak, has it really been implanted forever on our hearts.
I remember as a child a teacher coming into a classroom (I can remember which particular classroom and the teacher's name, Mr Jones.) and announcing that a man called Gandhi had been killed. We did not know of a man called Gandhi, or for that matter where India was but the word assassinated intrigued.
How many remember where they were when John F Kennedy's assassination was announced. I was outside my grandmothers in Ockbrook, Derbyshire, tinkering with a vehicle when someone came outside to announce the news. Yet I am unsure as to which vehicle was involved. Surely I haven't imagined so important a moment in history? I certainly didn't imagine being told of Elvis's death whilst on holiday with the children in Chapel St Leonards, Lincolnshire. The whole campsite was full of the news for hours if not days; nothing much ever happens in Chapel. In fact this is one of the few memories of the place retained more than twenty four hours. (Though childhood memories of Chapel are positive if unexciting, at least in adult eyes.)
Being a retired person with nothing better to do I was idly watching the news at home when the events of 9/11 unfolded on the TV screen. Transfixed I watched for hours as the sheer horror and importance of the event became apparent. History in the making, who wouldn't remember for ever such an awesome event.

My wife and I sat in a garage on Harvey Road in Derby when the sensational, sad news was announced on the radio that Princess Diana had been killed in a road accident. I even remember where we were going, to Wirksworth to buy a dog grate for the fireplace and then on to Chesterfield. I am not a Royalist so why should this event be so firmly imprinted in my mind?

It is a fact now that almost any event in the world can now be reported at very short notice indeed. Tsunamis, plane crashes, wars, disasters in general blur into each other; we are so bombarded with the worlds terrors and tribulations. Is it that we are fascinated by the dramatic or the morbid, for many of our memories involve death and destruction.

When I was a schoolboy capital punishment was still the norm in this country. Some murderers were hanged. At eight in the morning in London, nine o'clock elsewhere I seem to remember. I, and some other schoolmates were undoubtedly morbidly fascinated, to the extent that we would knowingly glance at the clock if it were a nine o'clock 'happening'.

It is virtually impossible to escape world events almost as they happen. But why do some events burn into our psyche more than others. I don't remember where I was for instance, when it was announced that John Lennon had been shot. What do you remember? Put it another way, to paraphrase Hal David and Burt Bacharach's 1960's song, 'What's it all about, Alfie.'