HAPPY 80th BIRTHDAY, SAINT ROBERT



Hard to imagine that I've outlived him. Even harder to imagine he'd be as old as my Mom, had he lived.
Had he lived, I envision a world without Watergate, without a Nixon Presidency. A world where 20,000 fewer servicemen died in Vietnam. A nation where people of all races were less mistrustful of each other. Where the poorest were taken care of far better than we do now. A place where all Americans strived to work harder, better, and more intelligently to better this world. A nation less hair-trigger to military violence.

Are these too far reaching? Perhaps. We'll never really know. All I know is, that the last time that black people and white people in this country stood solidly side by side one another was their unified grief over RFK's assassination, and in their sorrowful solidarity as they stood along the tracks of his funeral train from New York City to DC that awful June Saturday.

Bobby, you made our world better by being here for the short time you were part of it. I'm going to go on dreaming about the What-Might-Have-Beens without that fateful trip to the Ambassador's pantry. Someday I hope the Church confers the title officially.