It was a magically hot summer that year in July of 1969 when we prepared for the first moon walk with great anticipation. Like fables about the man in the moon or its composition being of green cheese, we likewise treated the impending news of this momentous event... only we knew it was not a fable. That did not change the absolute magic and unbelievability of that moment for us, back in our hot prairie town that summer.

We lived in a working class neighborhood and the advent of color television had just only begun to be popularized amongst our kinfolk. We, of course had a television, but it was still the old black and white model. This seemed to go along well with our second hand Dodge Dart, fully loaded, with push button transmission, manual steering and four roll down windows. Highway trips of this nature were akin to having a convertible, sans the light of the sun directly on your head... the wind blew through very well. By the way, these cars were built like tanks, talk about safety ratings.

So in order to immortalize this historical moment, we planned a dinner, along with my grandparents and a single aunt who still lived at home. The reason being, we were invited to watch the first moon walk at their home because they had just purchased a color television. Among the guests was my late great grandmother, 'Babusia' as well called her. She was in the big city, (which it was not) for a visit. She lived in a rural hamlet and recollections of visiting her there garner many fond memories as well. Sleeping in great feather beds, fetching potatoes from the root cellar in the middle of her kitchen, making toast on the stove top, using the outhouse and accompanying catalog, and catching cabbage butterflies in her gargantuan garden, are magical moments I recall fondly now in middle years.

When I ponder the changes that my grandparents and particularly my Babusia, have seen in their lifetimes, it behooves reason. It is no wonder that I recall this momentous and joyous occasion with thoughts of this nature. My great grandmother immigrated over to North America during a time before electricity. She witnessed industrialization, medical advancements, the First World War and then the greatest thing of all, the automobile and airplane. She used to fear the great speed of automobiles when first introduced into her family. So on that day, I understood that she could not, for all of her experience and living, believe that what she watched on the telecast that day, was real and true. She shook her head in disbelief that day, June 20th, 1969, over and over, and kept repeating in her Slavic tongue, this cannot be true, this cannot be true. But deep in her heart, she knew it was so.

We watched, spellbound in the living room of our grandparents home. The adults sat on the furniture and the children on the floor right under the modern, in wall mounted television. I can't remember the time of day, but it was still daylight and we could actually see the daylit moon outside. We would watch and run outside, incredulous that this was occurring right at that moment in time. All the now famous words were spoken, all the commentary followed, and with great satisfaction we retreated, or maybe we had already eaten, I don't remember, but we sat down to the treat of the KFC bucket meal and savored the modern times we lived in. And I could see my Babusia, her headscarf covering, her babushka, shaking back and forth in disbelief.