Thanks For the Memories............

A thoughtful guess says that this photo was taken in early 1961, and tucked away well, for treasures are still being found, and this is definitely an obscure sight.  The handle that the future curmudgeon in this picture is holding onto is on the stroller that belongs to his little sister Lisa.  Look at him gazing out the window of his family room, or 'recreation room', as Mom would call it. Was he longing for Spring as he does now, or was he content to watch the snow fall and anticipate his big sisters, Janet and Stephanie, taking him out to sled?  Could he ever predict that he would ever hold and raise children of his own, or was he just a regular kid who waited for a friend to be awake so he could go outside and play?  Would he think that he would ever be a husband and father in an ongoing timeline, as Facebook calls it, of events bringing struggles and great joy, or was he just watching and feeling the compassion and kindness of his own Dad as he tended his family?  He's in a room filled with fond memories that would shape his personality; after all, the little sister in the stroller would command protection and compassion from the big brother when Mom and Dad couldn't be at hand, and this is the room that housed the television that historical events like the moon landing, the assassinations of President Kennedy, Bobby Kennedy, and Martin Luther King were watched, as well as the Bob Hope specials, Lucy, Sally Starr, and countless other classics.  It had the phonograph that played Stephanie's first Beatles, Monkees and Four Seasons albums.  It had the aquarium that held the fish that would eat their young, and the newts that would escape and crawl on the carpet, much to Mom's shagrin, as well as the tiny turtles, Perky and Pokey, who would get big laughs with their playful antics.  Most of all, it had the chairs that would hold a family as it grew together, and  friends as they bonded.  It would be the center of activity in the home that guy lived in until his wedding more than twenty years later.  It's hard to believe that more than a half century has gone by, and that a more mature version of that little guy still gazes out the window in his own home contemplating the weather, while still tending to his own family, and watching a rerun of an old classic series or listening to the Beatles.   Like Bob Hope used to say, Thanks for the memories.........