What was going on when I was born?

One day after President Reagan declared himself a candidate last week for a second term, the civil war in Lebanon claimed its 259th American service victim. The death of Lance Cpl. George L. Dramis in a bombardment at the Beirut airport, and the heavy fighting that persisted much of the week, underscored one of the President's biggest political liabilities - the miring of the marines in Lebanon's seemingly endless conflicts.

Explaining the Stock Slide What's been pushing the stock market down in recent weeks? Of all the reasons market analysts offer for why investors are building their cash positions elsewhere, perhaps none is as pertinent as the fact that returns on Treasury bills and bonds remain greater than the average income from stock dividends. Until recently, the market's strong advance had overshadowed the high yields on financial instruments. But now, investors appear to be comparing stock dividends with yields on competitive investments. ''With increasing signs that the market and general economy may be a bit tired, professional portfolio managers are once again shopping for yields,'' said Raymond T. Dalio, president of Bridgewater Associates, an economic consultanting firm in Wilton, Conn. Last week, short-term investors found that rates on Treasury bills were 4.7 percent above the average stock dividend yield, Mr. Dalio says, while long-term investors found that Treasury bond yields were 3.7 percent higher.

HARTFORD NEVER before has the issue of hospital costs attracted such widespread and powerful interests in Connecticut. On one side, the state's most influential business and insurance organizations are aligned with the state's top hospital industry regulator, elected local officials and groups for the elderly in a fight for a payment system in which hospital charges would be set in advance for all patients. Opposing them are the Connecticut Hospital Association, the Connecticut State Medical Society, the Connecticut Nurses Association and Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Connecticut, which contend that the legislation would threaten the financial stability of hospitals and reduce the quality of health care. Governor O'Neill has stopped short of giving the plan a full endorsement, but said in a statement, ''We must design and support a new approach to hospital reimbursement.'' At a recent legislative hearing attended by all the concerned parties, Gardner E. Wright Jr., chairman of the State Commission on Hospitals and Health Care, which regulates hospitals in the state and which is sponsoring the legislation, said, ''Health costs in our state and nation are out of control. What we can and must do is put the brakes on hard on the entire health-care industry.''

The owners of the Paerdegat Racquet Club, overlooking the Paerdegat Basin in the Canarsie section of Brooklyn, are putting about $2 million into an expansion project that will turn the eight-court facility into a threelevel swim, exercise, racquet and health club. The new Paedergat Racquet Club, expected to open early in April, will include 11 new racquetball courts, two swimming pools, a whirlpool bath, a Nautilus exercise equipment room as well as a bar and restaurant.

The leader of Lebanon's Shiite Moslems called on Moslem Cabinet ministers today to leave the Government and asked Lebanese Army soldiers to diso bey orders to fight. The call, by Nabih Berri, came amid street clashes in Beirut between the army and Shiite militiamen. Government sources said Prime Minister Shafik al-Wazzan, a Sunni Moslem, had told President Amin Gemayel, who is a Christian, that the Cabinet was ready to resign in the hope of paving the way for a new government representing all factions. It would be the third time since Sept. 26 that Mr. Wazzan had offered his resignation. A later report by the Christian Phalangist radio said the President had accepted the offer. There was no immediate confirmation.

L AST winter, Peter Carruthers could hardly lift his sister, Kitty, during their pairs program in figure skating because of a painful shoulder injury. ''He was weak, you could feel it,'' Kitty recalled, describing their season as a nightmare. ''When he'd throw me, it was like a ton of bricks.'' In the XIV Olympic Winter Games that begin in Sarajevo, Yugoslavia, this week, the Carrutherses may venture into even more demanding physical frontiers if they attempt the first quadruple throw in a competition. The move, a throw quadruple salchow, which their coach, Ron Ludington, labels ''extremely dangerous,'' calls for Peter to wind up and throw his sister high enough off the inside of his right arm for her to wheel four times counter-clockwise through the air and still land on the back outside edge of her right foot.

Penny Lernoux is a freelance reporter based in Bogota, Colombia. Her book, ''In Banks We Trust,'' published this month, was the basis for this article. ''IVE never seen so many crooked goings-on in banks as in Florida,'' said the European head of a Miami bank. Not only had the bank's previous management been indicted for fraud, said the official, but hardly a day went by when the bank did not have to contend with forgeries, bad checks, credit card fraud and the like. While such stories might seem hyperbolic in other banking communities, they are common fare in Miami, where, in the view of law enforcement agents and many bankers, a deluge of ''hot'' money has attracted scoundrels from all over the world. Though top management in most South Florida banks does not sanction illegal activities, Federal authorities say that many banks there are being used by the underworld to siphon illegal money into legitimate financial channels. ''In Miami they have a saying in Spanish: 'The sharks are on the streets, not in the sea,' '' observed Richard Dailey, president of small Dadeland Bank.

The hockey dispute between the United States and Canada escalated tonight when the president of the Canadian Amateur Hockey Association raised the possibility of a Canadian withdrawal from the competition at the Olympic Winter Games here if four of their players are ruled ineligible because of an American protest. Murray Costello, the association president, also suggested that as many as four players on the current United States squad have violated their Olympic eligibility. He added that Canada was prepared to disclose their identities and challenge their eligibility if the United States Olympic Committee followed through with its plans to file a formal protest against the Canadians. Costello would not name any of the players who might be involved in a Canadian counter- protest. But according to an American hockey source familiar with the situation, three of the four American players are Phil Verchota and John Harrington, returning members of the 1980 gold-medal team, and Bob Mason, the backup goalie.

SINCE his first one-man exhibition in 1941, Jimmy Ernst of East Hampton has participated in the great era of development for abstract art in this country, and his paintings, which blend surface action with principles of transparency, control and the visionary, are regarded as highly original achievements. Now, with the publication of his unusual memoir, ''A Not So Still Life,'' readers will discover that he is more than an artist with a distinguished career; friends, colleagues and strangers have been touched by his intelligence and compassion. Readers will follow his observations of a traumatic boyhood as a half-Jew in Cologne, where he was born in 1920; the difficulties in having an internationally famous father (Max Ernst was a key figure in both Dada and Surrealism); the agony of trying to arrange his mother's escape from Hitler's web (the effort failed; she was placed on one of the last trains to Auschwitz) and his own struggles as an impoverished immigrant, unable to speak English. His art world recollections are particularly significant, for he witnessed major developments on both sides of the ocean. ''In the book, I wanted to make the European artists human, without taking away from their genius,'' Mr. Ernst said in a recent interview.

New owners are renovating a tax-delinquent, turn-of-the-century brick apartment building at the edge of a redevelopment area in Montclair, N.J., and expect it will be ready for tenants this summer. ''Most of the people who had been living there since the township took over the place were vagrants and squatters,'' said Alan F. Guillemain, a partner of Property Development Associates, the project's developers.

In Toms River, N.J., a 68-unit town- house condominium project is being built on an 11-acre site next to Dover Township's Manitou Park. The development, to be called Bey Lea Brook, will comprise two- and three-bedroom town houses with prices ranging from the mid-$70,000's to the upper $80,000's. The condominium community will have a swimming pool and a platform tennis court.

President Reagan's proposed budget for the fiscal year 1985 shows that the increase in interest payments on the Federal debt since he took office exceeds all the savings his Administration has achieved in health, education, welfare and social service programs. Federal officials said the increase was mainly a result of the growth of the budget deficit. If Federal revenue falls short of spending in any year, it creates a budget deficit, and the Government must borrow more money from the public. The accumulated total of such borrowing is the Federal debt.