But when you figure the number of people who could fit into a one-block section of Big Basin Way, and then factor in the distance from Blaney Plaza to Fifth Street, taking into account the constant coming and going and the fact that the street was always filled, the 30,000 figure doesn't seem out of line. Along this stretch there were 56 booths dispensing food and drink, as well as information on the Warner Hutton House youth center and the Saratoga Fire Department.

There were six bands furnishing music for entertainment and dancing, and there was a Fun Zone with rides and other activities geared to children's interests. Some 400 volunteers from Chamber organizations handled the myriad details and duties. Now, if only a fraction of those attending this event could be persuaded to make a habit of patronizing local businesses, Celebrate Saratoga! really could live up to its name. I like to think that, in a small way, I celebrate Saratoga in these columns.

Celebrations have been woven into this town's civic fabric for more than 100 years. The first Saratoga Blossom Festival, celebrating an expected bountiful fruit harvest, was held in 1900. With some interruptions, the Blossom Festival continued through 1941. World War II brought an end to the traditional format, but after the war there was an annual Blossom Time Chip-in Day, and in recent years, a Blossom Festival by that name, sans blossoms.

I missed this year's event because I was attending the annual reunion of my World War II outfit, the 20th Armored Division. It was held this year in Colorado Springs, Colo., and the location in itself made it a memorable event. As to the reunion, I'd say that the operative word was geriatric. All in all, though, the attending veterans were well-preserved, but some appeared quite feeble.

What I did find to be somewhat of a reach, though, was equating these octogenarians with the guys who were driving things like tanks and self-propelled artillery, and toting rifles in the armored infantry. I was in the latter category.

The 20th Armored didn't get over to Germany until the final weeks of the fighting in Europe. There were battle casualties in some of the units, but the combat command I was in circumvented the areas of major action, such as an officer candidate school for SS troops near Munich. The SS troops, Hitler's elite guard, were the only ones who were really fighting by that time. Citizen soldiers in the Wehrmacht had pretty much had it. I summarize my experience by saying I was there to kill or be killed, and as it turned out, I didn't have to do either.

We learned some years later that the 20th Armored had been scheduled for the second phase of the invasion of the main island of Japan in March 1946. We were to have landed on the plains east of Tokyo. Several months before, however, someone had dropped a couple of atomic bombs, obviating the necessity of an invasion. You might say that my feelings about the morality of the atomic bomb have been mixed.

In one sense, Colorado Springs, the site of our reunion, bears a striking resemblance to Silicon Valley. There is a concentration of high-tech industries, massive housing developments—the works. In fact, one resident told me the region is known as Silicon Rock.

One thing that area has that we don't is the mountainous terrain of the Rockies, including Pike's Peak. I went on a tour to the summit on the cog railway—it takes a rack-and-pinion arrangement to negotiate a 25-percent grade—and what they say about high altitude is all true. At 14,110 feet above sea level, oxygen is a scarce commodity, which you never really appreciate until you miss it. Saratoga has a lot of ideal qualities, and I'd say its approximately 400-foot elevation—depending on the part of town—is one of them.

In my most recent column, I referred to the production of a certain play in the Saratoga Grammar (now Elementary) School Auditorium in the 1940s. The play was Elmer Rice's Street Scene, and the article appeared without the name of the play. This play, given here by the Saratoga Players, was also staged more than 10 years later by Lilian Fontaine's Los Gatos Evening High School Theater Workshop in the high school auditorium. Maybe it's time for a revival at the Saratoga Civic Theater. Any volunteers?