What was going on when I was born?

A day after watching his Mets break out of a hitting slump in a 9-4 victory, Manager Dave Johnson presided over an embarrassing relapse today that affected not only the team's hitting, but its pitching as well. The Cincinnati Reds collected seven hits off three pitchers in the sixth inning, scored 10 runs and went on to embarrass the Mets, 14-2, before 21,362 fans at Riverfront Stadium. The winning pitcher, Jay Tibbs (1-4), held the Mets to four hits while the Reds battered four Mets pitchers for 14. Roger McDowell (2-1) took the loss for New York, but Doug Sisk took the brunt of the Reds' attack.

GOVERNOR O'NEILL waded into the debate on the Federal budget last week, journeying here to ask a Senate committee to freeze 1986 transportation spending at current levels rather than reduce or eliminate funds for Amtrak, commuter rail and bus lines, and highway and bridge projects. The Governor's 10-minute appearance in a Capitol Hill hearing room was on the same day that the Senate began voting on a compromise budget plan endorsed by President Reagan. Hours after Mr. O'Neill had addressed the Appropriations Subcommittee on Transportation and Related Agencies on Tuesday morning, the Senate approved, 50 to 49, a resolution that would end Amtrak subsidies and force deep cuts in mass-transit and road-building programs. It was the first of what is expected to be a long series of Congressional votes this spring on a the 1986 spending package.

End of Great Expectations Stock investors thrive on great expectations but since the Dow Jones industrial average closed at a record 1299.36 on March 1, their expectations have been anything but great. Last week, for example, the market, as measured by the Dow, closed at 1247.24, down 27.94 points on the week and 52.12 points from its peak close. ''The major reason the market has been weak is that investors have had their expectations shattered in recent weeks,'' said Monte J. Gordon, research director at the Dreyfus Corporation. People ''expected the economy to rise at a reasonable non-inflationary rate, but it isn't rising at all,'' he said. ''And, to make matters worse, corporate profits have been disappointing.''

THE sharp escalation in commercial rents in Manhattan in the last few years poses a curious dilemma for co-op buildings that rent such space. Instead of being able to enjoy this unexpected bonanza, some boards of directors are finding that it is jeopardizing the co-op's favorable tax status. At issue is the so-called ''80-20'' rule, which requires that a co-op's income for maintenance paid by tenant-shareholders in the residential portion of the building must be at least 80 percent of total revenues. When the 80-20 balance is maintained, tenant-shareholders may deduct from their taxable income the portion of their maintenance payments that goes to cover the building's real-estate taxes and interest costs on the underlying mortgage. They also may defer payment of a capital-gains tax if they sell their apartment and buy another, and qualify for the once-in-a-lifetime capital-gains tax exemption of $125,000 if they sell when they are 55 years old or older.

''IN the long run,'' said one Congressman, ''this becomes a very small issue.'' But then, he was a Democrat. Republicans were so angered over last week's seating of Frank McCloskey, a Democrat from Indiana's Eighth District, that they stormed out of the House of Representatives, fuming.

IT is difficult to imagine spending even one day at the General Electric Company without seeing signs of the turbulence that the nation's ninth-largest industrial concern is going through. Since 1981, when John F. Welch Jr. became chairman, change has come fast, leaving shrunken staffs and shuttered plants in its wake. And the upheaval is far from over. ''Is there pressure?'' asks the 49-year-old Mr. Welch rhetorically, sitting in his spacious office overlooking the Connecticut countryside and riveting a visitor with intense blue eyes. ''Is it going to get tougher next year and the next and the next? The answer is yes.'' The pace, not to mention the extent, of change, is particularly surprising at G.E., a 108-year-old corporate polyglot of light bulbs, robots, locomotives, and other products. The company has long been considered by management professors and consultants to be a model of modern management techniques. Value analysis, a widely used method of improving product design, was invented at G.E. Strategic planning, a formalized process for setting corporate goals, had its genesis at G.E. And G.E. was among the first to decentralize, divvying itself up into small, self-contained strategic business units with a high degree of autonomy from headquarters.

Rain fell in the Northeast and Middle Atlantic states this week, but it had little impact on the lingering drought, and officials expressed concern that there were problems ahead for agriculture, tourism, business and everyday activities. Dr. Kenneth H. Bergman, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service's climate analysis center here, said that the dry area extended from Maine to Florida, but that the hardest-hit was the region from southern New England to Virginia. A Dry April Preliminary data showed that April was the driest on record in at least 10 cities - New York; Syracuse; Binghamton, N.Y.; Bridgeport, Conn.; Concord, N.H.; Allentown, Pa.; Philadelphia, Baltimore, Washington and Norfolk. Dr. Bergman said he expected the number of cities on the list to rise substantially as new reports arrived. ''The drought has been a long-term thing that developed gradually,'' he said.

The world's seven leading industrial nations ended their annual economic summit conference here today with a majority agreeing on the urgency of negotiations to eliminate barriers to free trade, the No. 1 issue here. But they failed to set a date to start the talks because of relentless objections from France. President Reagan had made an urgent appeal for the talks to help him stem pressures in Congress for new American barriers against the rush of imported goods flooding the country, and he had the support of most of the other participants. The three days of deliberations, the longest stop on a 10-day trip President Reagan is making in Western Europe, have been eclipsed by public controversy over the visit the President will make Sunday to the military cemetery at Bitburg, which includes the graves of 49 Waffen SS soldiers, and the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp site. Struggle With Trade Issue But those questions intruded little upon the economic conference itself. There the national leaders, along with their finance and foreign ministers, struggled most with the question of world trade, which all consider vital to their growth and prosperity but disagree over how to provide for it.

MOVING swiftly after the House of Representatives rebuffed his latest request for aid to the Nicaraguan rebels, President Reagan made clear last week that he had not given up pressing for change in Managua. In an action at the start of his European trip that, perhaps not coincidentally, briefly drowned out the furor over his plan to visit the German military cemetery at Bitburg, Mr. Reagan announced an embargo on trade with Nicaragua. Declaring ''a national emergency,'' he advised Congress that Nicaragua's policies and actions ''constitute an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States.'' The declaration of ''a national emergency,'' which was required by law before sanctions could be invoked, had an ominous edge, suggesting additional steps to force the Sandinistas, in Mr. Reagan's phrase, ''to say uncle.'' Indeed, officials said, other sanctions were being considered, such as a break in diplomatic relations and a freeze on Nicaragua's remaining assets in the United States.

The Defense Department, in a surprising reversal, is prepared to accept reductions in military retirement pay, according to senior civilian officials in the Pentagon. Few issues are more sensitive or emotional in the armed forces than proposals that pensions for retired officers and noncommissioned officers be reduced. The chiefs of the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marine Corps adamantly opposed such cuts in testimony before Congress last month. They remain opposed.

For connoisseurs of French diplomacy, this year's economic summit meeting has been a classic play, reminiscent of the grand old style favored by Charles de Gaulle. For two days, President Francois Mitterrand, who is in deep political trouble at home and faces critical elections next spring, dominated the meeting, able singlehandedly to decide whether it would be judged a failure or a success. In the end, he took the lonely route, isolating himself from his colleagues by turning down their compromises and refusing to set a firm date for opening new trade negotiations when other conference participants would not accept France's terms. Breaking Ranks The international costs to France promise to be high, in the view of many Western diplomats, straining France's alliance with West Germany, breaking ranks with the Common Market and denying President Reagan the main result he sought from the conference. American officials stressed France's isolation and virtually every other leader diplomatically expressed ''disappointment'' with France's stand.

Thousands of illegal aliens, carrying mattresses, clothing and cooking utensils, poured back across the borders to their homelands today, ordered out by Nigeria's military rulers. The foreigners had been attracted to Nigeria in part by an oil boom in the 1970's, but now the West African nation has deep economic problems and an increasing crime rate, which it attributes in large measure to the immigrants. On Friday, the Government opened its borders to speed the expulsion of 700,000 foreigners. It was the first time Nigeria's borders with Benin, Niger, Chad and Cameroon were open since April 1984, when the Government closed them to combat the black market in the country's ailing currency, the naira.