This morning, I happened into the middle of a radio conversation about Ted Kennedy. I think the speakers were local writers/columnists, cartoonists. Dunno. I turned it off after a few minutes because I couldn't listen and read my book at the same time. One of the panelists talked about being at a dinner where he sat next to Ted Kennedy and said he was tempted to say something dopey about "are you still around?" because while for many people, Ted Kennedy was the big white-haired guy in the Senate, for many others, as the comments went on, there was this whole other life. And someone then commented about seeing, in the last couple of days, all those black and white photos.

And I began to wonder about using that as a dividing line. Black and white v. color. Not television so much, but photos. How clearly I can see some family photos that dad took of "Constitution Plaza" (which looks way better in b&w) and how clearly I can see the photo of my sister in that blue dress. And I would not have remembered it was blue, I suspect without color film.

Photos that streamed across the news channels Wednesday and Thursday (to the point when I stopped watching because did we really need the same five bits of film?) showed black and white Teddy and color Ted. But the before/after is significan,t for there are going to be lots of people who don't understand much of the head-shaking and dismay, the different sense of loss, the "aw, you had to be there" felt by, well, by folks old enough to remember the three brothers and those photos. It was a different world, and Ted Kennedy was a different man. Remembering the feeling of "dynasty", the awareness of Hyannis as the hang-out of what is often referred to as American royalty. Remembering the years of John Kennedy and that stunning photogenic family. John and Bobby sailing, Jackie and the children, and on and on. The three brothers conversing, with the imprint of "Kennedy" clearly on each face, interpreted differently.

As these events unfolded, we watched in black and white. It's getting harder to remember the reality as it differs from the portrayals of reality. Much to my amusement, I cannot clearly remember Jackie's tour of the white House, but I sure remember the fabulous parody from the comedy record album ("and over there is a great BIG picture") My mind supplies photos of Lee Harvey Oswald and funeral corteges in black and white. But I know that the boy we all called "John-John" wore blue - I don't think I saw it though.

Much depends on specific age and expectations. People only a couple years older than me can talk about Robert Kennedy and will describe a completely different man than what I saw. Those of us old enough to know and remember what Teddy Kennedy was and what he morphed into will have very different stories. One of the commentators on the radio said that he looked forward to reading a really good biography of Ted Kennedy, to examine all the different sides of the man and how he changed, transformed, and became who he was. The one we remember.

I remember flaws and do not believe in "speaking only good of the dead. I think, in fact, that that's horseshit. Of course, one doesn't badmouth the person to family and friends, but Teddy Kennedy made some huge honkin' big mistakes in his life, and they weren't all "youthful indiscretions".

Ted Kennedy was where he should have been, in the US Senate. I felt the same way about Humphrey. Neither man, I'm guessing, wanted to be president but felt obligated to try. Both were successful in getting things done in the Senate and , I believe, forced people to respect them. And both moved from a black and white world to a color world. There's heavy symbolism there, obvious though it is. From Daly City to Janis' dresses and bangles. From "Mad Men" conformity, and companies requiring white shirts and the battle for women to be allowed to wear pantsuits to, well, Woodstock. Of the changes that came in those years as George Harrison put in a song "when we was fab". And we was.

I don't intend in any way to be simplistic, to say that life was altered when we got color film (or color television). It's just a way to think about things and it make me think about a lot of things this morning.