What was going on when I was born?

When the seven leaders of the industrial democracies meet in London beginning Thursday, their agenda will include a host of problems that many people blame on the Federal deficits. But the deficits themselves will not be among them. President Reagan and the six other heads of Government are expected to discuss a global economic recovery that, experts say, differs from the usual pattern in troubling ways: Protectionism is spreading, although a normal recovery should mitigate such pressures. Interest rates are rising at a stage when most economists say they should be falling. The dollar remains exceptionally strong, defying trade patterns, and unemployment in Western Europe is stubbornly high, although it has fallen significantly in the United States. To many economists and some of the leaders at the London meeting, these anomalies are rooted in the tax and spending policies of the United States, whose economy is roughly the size of those of the six other nations combined. In particular, they point to the $200 billion budget deficits that are the joint handiwork of the Reagan Administration and Congress.

COREY PAVIN stood behind his ball on the back fringe of the 18th hole at the Phoenix Country Club last January, waiting while Tom Purtzer addressed his ball in a bunker in front of the green. These two players - Pavin, a rookie in his second PGA Tour event, and Purtzer, a veteran of 10 years on the tour - were tied for the lead in the Phoenix Open at that moment. Purtzer blasted to within inches of the hole and he easily got a birdie. Then Pavin stroked his putt of about a dozen feet in an attempt to force a playoff. The ball just slid by and Purtzer was the winner. Such a close finish without victory could be a disappointment too difficult to swallow for some golfers.

In 1981, the Sagamore Hotel, a sprawling colonial-style resort compound on a 70-acre island in Lake George at Bolton Landing, N.Y., closed after nearly 100 years in business.

After a wearying week of coast-to-coast campaigning, the three Democratic Presidential candidates are awaiting a critical verdict on Tuesday from the voters of California, New Jersey, South Dakota, New Mexico and West Virginia. A strong run through this final round of primaries probably would seal the nomination for Walter F. Mondale. A weak performance could spark what Robert S. Strauss, the former party chairman, called a period of ''hand to hand combat'' for delegates all the way to the national convention in San Francisco next month.

Without flinching, he calls Broadway a ''sewer.'' Working for Peter Hall at Britain's National Theater was like ''working for Nixon.'' Television has done ''a terrible disservice to literature.'' And, as for the movies, a forthcoming film based on a literary masterpiece, is ''a Thalidomide abortion.'' Acerbic as well as opinionated, Jonathan Miller has courted controversy as if she were a duchess. As a result - and partly by choice - he has endangered his own employability. In a career just short of 25 years, he has responded by becoming peripatetic, batting back and forth among the arts and between England and America. Against odds, he has maintained a position as a director of classics on stage, in opera houses and on television, and also as an author, lecturer and television host of the popular medical series, ''The Body in Question.'' Just a year ago, he announced his retirement from the arts - a threatened curtain to a career that he began in 1960 as a comedian, one quarter of ''Beyond the Fringe'' - and a fulltime return to medicine, the profession for which he was trained. He has a research fellowship in neuropsychology and has a particular interest in the human brain. While participating in the arts he has ''felt remorse about not being in medicine.''

THE curators are as different from each other as the collections they own. George Sherwood retired from engineering and turned a hobby into a vocation. Elizabeth Tashjian decided that an ''edible delight'' was a work of art. Harold and Gladys Tantaquidgeon, among the last of the Mohegans, worked to preserve a heritage. As a young blacksmith's apprentice in the West Indies, Wentworth T. Phillips made a promise to his father and worked for decades to fulfill it. Their varied lives produced four of the most unusual museums in Connecticut put together by single collectors. Mr. Sherwood shows kerosene lamps. Miss Tashjian exhibits nuts, nutcrackers, and paintings and sculptures that try to show why she believes ''nuts are so beautiful.'' The Tantaquidgeons show Indian artifacts. And Mr. Phillips displays farm implements. The museums are owned and run by the individuals who founded them. Their stories are as much a part of the exhibits as the items they collect.

I N view of the Reagan Administration's support for rebels bent on overthrowing the Nicaraguan Government, there was general surprise that Secretary of State George P. Shultz should pay a visit to Managua last week to discuss openings for peace with Daniel Ortega Saavedra, the Nicaraguan leader. The airport meeting, which Mr. Shultz described as ''direct and candid,'' will be followed by other talks, he and Mr. Ortega said. Mr. Shultz, who was said to have been instructed by President Reagan to ''figure out a way to bring peace to the region,'' presumably pressed American demands that Nicaragua stop helping guerrillas in El Salvador, get rid of its Soviet and Cuban advisers and make good on promises to restore democracy at home. The Administration appeared to have embarked on a double-track policy of dialogue and military pressure. The American willingness to talk to the Nicaraguans was linked by Mexican officials with new efforts by Mexico to improve relations with El Salvador. Foreign Minister Bernardo Sepulveda Amor attended the inauguration of Jose Napoleon Duarte as El Salvador's President last week, as did Mr. Shultz. But the Administration's request for $21 million for the Nicaraguan rebels remained on the agenda of a House-Senate conference this week.

The Indian Army today took control of the security of the state of Punjab, where 22 people were killed in the past two days in the continuing Sikh campaign for greater autonomy. In announcing the step, the Home Ministry also restricted travel to the Punjab by foreigners. A similar restriction has applied for some time in the violence-torn area of northeastern India that includes Assam. Under the order, the army will assume police functions and try to quell the violence. So far in the 22- month-old campaign for automony by Sikhs in the Punjab, the state police and paramilitary forces have tried to handle the situation.

IT'S the way recoveries work. First, consumer spending powers the nation out of the depths of recession. Then, a few months later, business spending for new plant and equipment kicks in like a booster rocket, pushing the economy higher and higher. It happened that way last year. Capital spending picked up speed in the first half, when the recovery was about six months old. It's been booming every since and is expected to soar by 13.6 percent this year over last to a record $343.6 billion in outlays.

A new generation of apartment developers is on the rise in Manhattan, taking its place beside the individuals and families who have built a substantial share of the borough's new apartments in the last two decades. The pattern in New York is for family-run investment building companies sooner or later to veer away from residential construction toward office development, if they remain active in the city at all. Office demand is strong and there are no rent regulations to limit returns on a long-term investment. Thus, investment builders of the capacity of the Rudins and the Minskoffs appear to have bowed out of new apartment construction entirely, while other developers are continuing to try to build, mostly in Manhattan. Among them are the Roses, Kalikows, Milsteins, Lefraks, Glicks, Trumps, Goodsteins and Manocherians. One builder, Donald Zucker, has managed to keep a cycle of production going almost continuously through the 1970's and 1980's.

As New York City cooperative apartments become increasingly valuable, planning for their smooth and equitable disposition in the event of divorce, separation or death grows in significance. It is not simply a concern of the tenant- shareholder. Co-op board members are also learning that unless they take precautions, they can lose their right to control who the next tenant will be. ''Even though boards may be sympathetic to the problems of one particular person, they must learn to make some hard decisions because what they do affects everyone else in the corporation,'' said Charles Rappaport, president of the Federation of New York Cooperatives, at a workshop the federation recently held on the topic. At other times, he said, directors could inadvertently involve the corporation in a messy domestic dispute.

EUGENE, Ore. WHEN his running was going well, Alberto Salazar was unbeatable. On the roads, he was the fastest marathoner in history. On the track, he was the fastest American distance runner in history. All that changed last year. For the first times, he ran in international marathons and he finished fifth in both. In track and field's first world championships, he ran the 10,000 meters, qualified last for the final and finished last. The bubble had seemingly burst. He was no longer a winner. To many people, Alberto Salazar was history.