My family idolized President Kennedy because he was Catholic. My father recalled his exact movements when Kennedy was shot.  My aunt placed a painting of Kennedy over her fireplace.  Even though Kennedy died before I was born, I had his plastic bust in my bedroom. 

Charlie, my neighbor and childhood friend, collected clippings from the assassination period. As kids, in my backyard, we reenacted Jack Ruby shooting Lee Harvey Oswald. Charlie always played Oswald, squishing up his face and grabbing his side as I pretended to shoot him with my sister’s cap gun.

Forty-five years later, I still have the plastic bust, and Charlie and I are still friends. If I point my finger at him like a gun, he still winces. And we both still wonder why Ruby shot Oswald, why Oswald shot Kennedy, and what the world would be like had Kennedy lived.