What was going on when I was born?

"ONE editor was telling me that he was no longer going out to lunch with other publishing people, because it was too depressing," a liter ary agent recounted not long ago. "All they do is sob about one problem or another. So he would say he had an acupuncture appointment or needed an emergency haircut. Anything to avoid hearing more bad news."

SAYREVILLE THE shroud of polluted air that has long greeted motorists near the Raritan Toll Plaza of the Garden State Parkway should be considerably reduced by this time next year, state and Federal environmental officials said last week.

WASHINGTON--After years of relative inattention to the control of immigration, there are signs that the incoming Congress, with encouragement from the Reagan administration, may confront a ...

MADRID--Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi of Libya has a vision of a sprawling confederation of Saharan states that, fired by a shared belief in Islam, would become the corner

WASHINGTON--Barring what one Iranian official called "a miracle" in the next three weeks, the Reagan Administration will face the same agonizing issue that frustrated the best efforts of Jimmy Carter and his advisers--how to bring home the 52 American hostages in Iran.

THE Year of the Coast, proclaimed by President Carter for 1980, is rapidly ebbing, leaving behind stalled legislation that may eliminate efforts in the county to work out a comprehensive plan for shoreline management and lengthen the battle between commercial and environmental interests.

MICHAEL WALZER is a prominent teacher of political philosophy, but in this volume he does not deal primarily with "deep theory," of which he finds Marxism most persuasive. Instead, he presents 18 political arguments or essays that illustrate his political perspective. He wants to show the reader where he stands.

NEWARK AFTER members of the New Jersey Symphony voted last week to accept a new contract drafted by attorneys for both the musicians and management, Casimer Kossakowski, chairman of the musicians' Negotiating Committee, and John Toth, the concertmaster, celebrated with a few beers.

CONNECTICUT'S so-called "workfare" program, requiring municipalities to establish work, education or training programs for able-bodied persons receiving local welfare, begins Thursday to the cheers, boos and indifference of the state's 169 municipalities.

WITH the cost of the MultiTown regional refuse facility in Suffolk now estimated at $200 million, Town Supervisor Michael A. LoGrande of Islip now says he has "serious doubts" that the project is still economically feasible. He says that the town will pull out of the project unless it can be built for $125 million.

It was early spring when my husband's string quartet of 10 years' standing decided to become the Artful Bargers. As amateurs of the good life as well as amateurs of music, they could think of no better vacation spot to indulge in a marathon practice session than on France's Burgundy Canal.