Moon Landing Anniversary

I forgot to wish everyone a happy Apollo 11 walking-on-the-moon anniversary yesterday - July 20, 1969.

That was 37 years ago.

On July 20, 1969 I was 4 years old and camping with my family at Point Pelee National Park. Now that was a long time ago because public camping was stopped at Point Pelee not too long afterwards.

We had our monstrous blue army issue tent that reeked of smoldering canvas or mildew or both. We couldn't tell the difference anyway - canvas to us was the baked smell of mildew when heated in the sun. That tent was the kind with two rooms separated by large metal zippers. The front had a dining area as it had the large screened in windows. The back area had smaller windows that had flaps and canvas ties on the outside which we kids used to untie when our older brothers and cousins were changing into their swim suits.

Dad brought our little black and white T.V and my sister our pet raccoon - Racky, which she most likely named after the Beatles song. Dad and my uncle brought their cases of stubbies - Molson Canadian or Export and sat on their little foldable lawn chairs watching the moon landing.

Dad was always aware of the importance of history and duly documented historical events, either by keeping copies of the Windsor Star at the time of the Kennedy assassination, taking my older siblings to the edge of the Detroit River so they could watch the riots from the quiet Canadian side or take consecutive photos of the Edmund Fitzgerald as it passed between Windsor and Detroit.

On that black and white day Dad used his 8 millimeter to film our little black and white television as it televised the radio signals from the moon. We kids stared at the black and white for as long as our attention span allowed us, occasionally jumping up after sitting quietly cross-legged while remnants of pine needles, twigs, patches of grass and a member of an ant colony stuck to us.

I'm a fan of technology and of the space missions. I learned to read with Mr. Mugs, those grade school readers whose characters went to the moon and lived in space stations. Our grade one class painted a large moon mural and my best friend got to wear a space outfit and climb a ladder so our beautiful teacher - whom we all adored- took a short film of Ricky waving his arms and sending his greeting from our only satellite.

So I thought it was only fitting to celebrate this anniversary watching an Australian film about a radio telescope and it's nerdy heroes in a film called The Dish. It's subtle humour and innocent beauty gives a snap shot of day to day life during this time period in the '60's gives it it's endearing quality. A great 60's sound track completes the nostalgia.