What was going on when I was born?

''I had a concept,'' said Bill P. Jennings, ''Beep'' to his legions of admirers and friends in these parts, former chairman of the failed Penn Square Bank. Sitting alone in a small, sparsely furnished office in the handsome Suburban Plaza Hotel here last Friday, he said he could not speak with reporters on the advice of counsel. He is tall, thin, slightly stooped and unassuming. His hair was neatly combed flat against his baldish head, and two cigars stuck out from the pocket of his blue-and-white striped shirt. His collar was open, and he wore no tie. ''I had a concept,'' he said, politely.

Saudi Arabia is considering selling oil to companies outside the Aramco group, apparently because its four American partners have let Saudi output drop to the lowest level in a decade, the Middle East Economic Survey said today. The weekly magazine said that the Arabian American Oil Company partners found Saudi Arabia's crude oil to be overpriced, but that Riyadh was not contemplating any price cuts.

Lebanese and Palestine Liberation Organization officials reacted cautiously today to reports from Jerusalem that the Israeli Cabinet had softened its conditions on the withdrawal of the P.L.O. guerrillas from west Beirut. The special American envoy, Philip C. Habib, was expected back in Beirut Monday with the latest Israeli negotiating position, which reportedly involved concessions on previous demands that a list of the names of all guerrillas leaving be turned over before the evacuation and that a multinational peace force not be deployed until a week after the P.L.O. withdrawal begins. Israeli officials have expressed concern that once the multinational force was in place some guerrillas might try to slip underground and stay in west Beirut. Both Israeli demands were unacceptable to the Palestinian guerrillas and their Lebanese intermediaries.

Rich Gossage was pounded for four eighth-inning runs today to squander a two-run lead and send the Yankees to a 6-4 loss to the White Sox. The bruising inning began with a quirky situation that Gossage refused to blame for the beginning of his downfall. With Jerry Hairston pinch-hitting for Ron LeFlore, and the count at 0-1, the Yankee reliever thought the batter had stepped out the box and called time, and he released a pitch that floated high over the plate like an errant lob. Gossage subsequently walked Hairston and then Tony Bernazard, and the runners advanced on a passed ball by Rick Cerone.

Two years after Algeria abruptly cut off liquefied natural gas deliveries to its major American customer, the North African nation is prepared to start shipping again to the United States. This time, however, Algeria will be selling smaller quantities of gas to a different company, and few analysts believe that American utilities will be relying heavily on Algerian gas any time soon. Despite the fact that Algeria will get a good deal less for its gas than it had sought, the price is still high, angering some of the final consumers. Tied to Cost of Oil And the way the price has been calculated - by referring to the costs of crude oil - conflicts with United States Government policy. Thus there is a feeling that Federal regulators might quash the new deal with Algeria.

In areas ranging from tax-exempt bonds to subway-car leasing to sewage rates, New York State and New York City fared well in the tax bill completed by the House-Senate conference today, according to the state's lobbyist here. The most important outcome for New York State was the retention of its ability to issue tax-exempt bonds for economic development, said the lobbyist, Brad C. Johnson. The tax-exempt industrial development bonds, which are issued by the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, the Dormitory Authority, the Housing Finance Agency and other agencies, were threatened earlier this year by a Reagan Administration proposal to limit their use severely. The state is hoping to finance $12.3 billion of construction through the use of tax-exempt bonds, Mr. Johnson said.

The collapse of a small government-securities concern has set off a wide re-examination of how New York State agencies should invest cash they have on hand. The State Comptroller's office said yesterday it was considering the establishment of uniform guidelines for the state's authorities. Until now, the different authorities have decided on their investment practices independently of the state, as they are empowered to do. At the same time, the State Dormitory Authority said it had established a new, stricter policy of its own. That agency lent nearly $300 million of its excess cash to the concern that entered bankruptcy proceedings last week, Lombard Wall Money Markets Inc. The concern is a subsidiary of Lombard Wall Inc., which also filed bankruptcy proceedings.

The Cities Service Company, badly shaken after the Gulf Oil Corporation canceled a $5 billion merger deal a week ago, bounced back last Friday when the Occidental Petroleum Corporation offered to buy the company for $50 a share in cash and stock, or what appeared to be $4 billion for the company's 80 million shares. But Wall Street sources said that, even if Cities Service officials welcomed the offer today after a special 4:30 P.M. meeting of its directors, the situation had all the earmarks of a cliffhanger. Occidental, they argued, might still face serious competition for Cities Service from other potential suitors that might easily outbid Occidental. They said that, while Occidental was offering nearly $2 billion in cash for half the Cities Service stock in public hands, the other half would be swapped for a nominal $50 in Occidental securities that were being valued on Wall Street at far less. Some professional traders valued Occidental's combined offer of cash and securities as low as $42.50 a share - meaning that another bidder could offer even less than $50 in cash for all of Cities Service and thus outbid Occidental.

''The right to associate cannot be enforced on us by anyone, nor can anyone deprive us of that right.'' -Archbishop Jozef Glemp of Poland. (A1:4.)

Speaking to more than 120,000 pilgrims assembled under the medieval walls of the Jasna Gora monastery today, Poland's Roman Catholic Primate urged a new dialogue between the authorities and the people to relieve what he called an ''invisible hatred.'' The Primate, Archbishop Jozef Glemp, delivered the sermon from the ramparts of the hilltop monastery at an open-air mass. The mass marked the culmination of a nine-day pilgrimage by foot from Warsaw and other major cities across Poland to venerate the nation's national icon, the Black Madonna, on the feast of the Assumption. The pilgrims, joined by tens of thousands of the faithful who arrived by car, train or foot just for the mass, filled the entire hillside under the monastery walls and spilled over into adjacent squares, streets and parks.

Hunkered down in the wasteland of broken buildings just a few dozen yards away from Israeli positions near the Beirut airport, the Palestinian guerrilla officer was asked if his men had taken many casualties during last week's heavy bombing and shelling. The company commander in the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine - he gave his name only as ''Omar'' - tossed his head back and made the short, sibilant sound in the roof of his mouth that is the Arab world's gesture of utter disdain. ''Not a single one,'' he said. ''It is so difficult to hurt us.'' What is becoming clear here is that the stepped-up bombardments that began on Aug. 1 and ended with a cease-fire after 11 uninterrupted hours of bombing last Thursday had little effect on the Palestinian guerrillas in and around west Beirut.

They arrive at the playing field in rusty pickup trucks pulling battered horse trailers. Some mounts are little more than nags, and the uniforms of a few teams could stand color coordination. This is middle-class polo, not the game played by British peers, Bolivian tin heirs and Argentine land barons who have strings of ponies. This different class of player hasn't the wherewithal to pay for the services of others and must do all the work himself: breaking the horse, schooling it, rubbing it down and taking care of its equipment and feed.