After a discussion with my students about how every media outlet we can find has its own spin, its own agenda, its own take on reality, my talented writer friend Rebecca Morean shared this poignant memory of the “way it was.”
For years, I wanted to marry Walter Cronkite. Despite the age difference. Every night, after dinner, after the pots and pans were settled on shelves and my brother sat gurgling in his playpen, my mother, grandparents and I would watch Walter Cronkite on CBS, Channel 2, from 7:00 to 7:30, Monday through Friday.
The first tingling of a crush began at five as I stood in scuffed white Stride Rights watching Mighty Mouse in black and white and the screen suddenly flickered and rolled. Mighty Mouse vanished and there he was, sitting behind a desk, speaking, telling me the president had been shot. Of course I knew who Walter Cronkite was—I was weaned on his news reports—but when he took those black horned rimmed glasses off, wiped his eyes and struggled to stay so terribly in control, I wanted to kiss him on the cheek. I touched the screen at…
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CL Pauwels at Large 
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