Moon in the Sky '73. (Stories from the 70's Part I)

The moon is the same today as it was in 1973.

     This tale will only mean something to three people and it will be meaningless to the masses, but I need to share this one anyway.  The incident in this tale is the creature that brought about the tile "Moon in the Sky" to this blog and has been an inside joke to a very small handful of people close to me.

  This incident took place sometime between circa 1972 and 1974, which would put me between one and three.  I was old enough to actually remember the incident, so my gut is telling me is is more towards 1973 or 1974.  I'm going along with 1973 just because I can...  Also, this "performance" might have actually taken twice, I only recall the one time though.  

     I was the last child of parents who came of age during the War and had been children in the Depression.  My closest Sister in age is exactly 15 years and one day older than I am.  The other Sister in the story is five years older than her.  

    It was an evening, I totally forget what time time of year but guessing it was Spring or Summer?  For some reason my Sister's were taking a drive to a town about 15 miles away (Sandusky, Ohio, from Bellevue, Ohio).  I was coming along with them, I have no clue whey I was, but who cares we were going to stop by a place that had toys!  

     On the fateful early 1970's evening I had somehow made my way back and laid on the package tray of my Sister's car.  Having a child lay on the shelf under the rear window in a car without restraint would totally horrify people today, but we were tougher kids back then.  

     We must have been about five miles out town headed Northeast towards our destination of Sandusky, Ohio and the promise of hitting the toy aisle at a local shop.  I craned my head to get a view of the still light, but evening just around the corner sky.  It was one of those early evenings when the sky was light but the moon was very visible.  

   I must have visually locked on the moon very early on in the journey.  I still can see this sight, after all these decades.  It was large and white, not the bright yellow the moon is at night, but white.  Just enough to catch the attention of a child who was just learning to talk and notice things.  There I am laying on the rear package tray of my Sister LeRose's '73 Chevy Vega*. with my eyeballs zeroed on the moon.  

    What I recall of the story is me commenting on how strange it was to be about to see the moon so clear when it was very much daylight still,  At that age I understood that the Sun equaled daytime and the moon was for the night.  That image is seared into my brain, it is 2023 and I still recall that evening sky from 1973.  My side of the story is my educated argument about the daytime belonged to the solar body that the Earth revolved around and the Lunar body orbited the Earth...at night.  

  My Sisters LeRose and Sue have a very different take on that fateful evening**....  What they remember coming from my gob goes something like this...

"Moon in the sky, moon in the sky, moon in the sky, moon in the sky, moon in the sky, moon in the sky, moon in the sky, moon in the sky, moon in the sky, moon in the sky",...and it goes on like this for the whole 20 minute drive to Sandusky, Ohio....  That is their take on what happened.  All I recall is seeing the sky from the back of LeRose's car and seeing the moon and commenting on it being visible in the daylight.

     From what I was told years, I just did not shut up!!!  It was "Moon in the sky" over and over.  No amount of early 1970's pop music coming from the speaker blasting CKLW on AM could cover up my "performance" that day.  

     In the early 1970's...the Moon was a big deal.  We (the United States) had just stopped sending men to the moon. The Apollo Missions had just wound down by then, and the afterglow of July 1969 and the first landing on the Moon were still in the public mind.  I was negative one and a half when the first Lunar Landing took place, but I still recall hearing about it still four or so years later.

     This fateful evening in my life has been sort of an inside joke between my two Sisters.  I remember the incident enough, that I can have a visual made up memory of the time.  I do recall riding in the back of my Sister's car, I do recall seeing the moon and commenting on it being daylight.  That part is clear still today.

    Why this means this much to me that I named my blog about it?...I don't know really?  Just stood out in my mind.  I'd always to love to learn how to be a songwriter and make a song titled "Moon in the Sky" and I could copyright it 1973, I don't know...I guess you just had to be there.

     I don't recall the trip home.  My Sister Sue was still in High School then, LeRose probably had started working as a Teacher then?  I don't recall if my Dad was sitting on his chair picking at the jungle rot on his feet that he got in the Pacific during the War.  The biggest thing I was thinking about is if we made it back before "Gunsmoke" came on the telly.  

     Sort of like the first day of Boot Camp that would take place in June 1989, this is one image in my past that has remained,  and thank God for that!  

*My memory tells me this took place in the back of LeRose's 1973 Chevy Vega, which was brand new at the time.  If this took place earlier, it was an early 1960's Mercury Comet.  

**There is the possibility that this whole "Moon in the Sky" ride might have taken place twice?  After talking with my Sisters, I get confused if I mixed up the trip with LeRose and Sue and seeing the Moon in the daytime sky with an earlier incident?  Also I might have got LeRose's cars mixed up?  If there were two times, then the first time might have taken in the back of an early 1960's Mercury Comet?  It really does not matter...