Time Capsule - 1962

I'm surrouned by scrapbooks. From the time I was 10, I have been taking photos and putting them into scrapbooks, creating a history of my life for the one or two people who might be interested after I'm gone. One piece of advice I can give anybody thinking about starting such a project is: rubber cement has a limited lifespan! All those things I glued carefully into a scrapbook with rubber cement are now loose on the pages and every time I pick up a book, things fall out of it.

I was looking at one such book and thought it might be interesting to make a kind of "time capsule out of it." It was 1962, a good year, because the Giants won the National League pennant, as my first couple of pages show:

I went to a lot of sporting events that year, according to the scrapbook. Giants baseball games, Cal football and basketball games. I also went to a lot of theatre, with programs for shows from the Civic Light Opera's 25th anniversary season, a play starring Gene Barry and Angie Dickinson, and a one-man show with Maurice Chevalier (I don't remember seeing that!),

There is a business card from what was our then favorite restaurant, Little India. It was a hole in the wall place that we went to frequently. They had a soup called "dahl" which I still refer to as "gunpowder soup," because it had a slight taste of the way gunpowder smells. I remember the night we were the only people in the place late at night. They were trying everything to get us to leave. After they peeked around the wall several times to see that Walt was still eating, they started putting up chairs and mopping the floor around us. We finally took the hint. I really miss that restaurant. It closed a long time ago.

Early in the scrapbook I found a picture of Walt's sister, when she came to visit California after she graduated from high school.

The depressing thing about this photo is that I swear Alice Nan looks exactly the same today as she did in 1962!

Walt joined the Air Force reserves this year and we had a going away party for him, where he was given a bunch of gifts like a potato peeler and toilet plunger, which he probably put to good use during his six weeks of basic training!

He apparently got a lot of beer and rum at the party (since we were big rum drinkers during that period), as well as an American flag and some cigars (he smoked cigars occasionally in those days). He then went off to Lackland AFB in Texas and I started keeping him up to date on what was going on in his absence.

He left me with his car, which caused me no end of headaches while he was gone..

Shortly after he left for Texas, the Newman Club went on a "pilgrimage" to one of California's missions. We used to do this all the time. A group of us would get on a bus, with a priest moderator, and we would go camp on the grounds of one of the old missions. We would have discussion sessions, prayer sessions, go on walks, attend Mass every day, and mostly socialize. I remember going to confession while walking along the path with Father Fisher. The first (and last) time that I went to confession without a booth and a screen between me and the priest involved.

Since Walt wasn't able to come along, I dressed in jeans, boots, and I believe that might have been one of his red plaid shirts. It was a man's shirt anyway, and Walt's hat. I was filling in for him while he was gone, so nobody would miss him.

By 1962, I had started fostering Hyun Joo, the little girl from Korea that I fostered through Foster Parents Plan. I had a great time buying things for her, including both the dress, coat and hat in the colored photo and the teddy bear and dress that she's wearing in the photo of her with her brother.

There are lots of photos taken at a 5-person birthday party at my friend Jeri's house. The hostess was very gracious, apparently (I'm the one with her hands around Walt's neck as he kisses Jeri).

The end of the scrapbook details a trip to New York and Washington D.C. that Walt and I took (he was taking me home to meet his mother). Kennedy was in office and we visited the White House, a very different experience from what it is to visit it today -- no metal detectors, for one thing! -- and I'm pretty sure you couldn't take this photo today.

(can you believe I was walking around Washington, DC
wearing heels????? I sure can't!)

We also drove out to Gettysburg and Walt found a possible relative.

(no information about whether Sykes was a MODERN Major General)

In one way, I'm really glad to have all these scrapbooks, though I'm very upset that none of the photos are sticking any more. Maybe I'll find some better glue and start a "scrapbook restore" project. That should only take me a couple of years, given how many books I have to work with!!!