I don't have any "wedding" photos. I wonder if any were even taken. It was a hard time for them at the moment. His father had died suddenly just two weeks earlier on September 21. So they had decided to move the wedding up so Daddy, at age 21, could take over the family farm. They had work to do. Only 3 short years earlier on June 21, 1944, Dad's older brother, Buck was killed in the war. I'm sure everyone must have needed something to smile about for a change.
What a time for Mom, too. As Daddy likes to tell it, when they got married (says he) she couldn't boil water. She had come from a large family of 9 children to her own household in a big old farmhouse, living with her new husband and mother-in-law, with the responsibility of cooking three meals a day and learning to become a farm wife. Dad's mom, Big Mama we called her, taught Mom a lot and together they pulled the family into a new era. (Mom became one of the best cooks around here, and with her own published cookbook to boot)!
The following year their first child Jacqueline was born. The joy did not last though and at age 2½ little Jackie passed away. Also in 1950 the remains of the B-17 flight crew of which my Dad's brother had been part of, were finally returned from Germany to the US for burial in Arlington.
Two years later I appeared and three years after that my brother came. Things settled into "normal" for the most part, like they do on a farm... some good crops, some bad. Together they got us through it all.
Now, at age 85 things have slowed down a bit for them. No, wait... that can't be right! Their house is still the place to go to for lots of people in the neighborhood. Mom and Dad have tons of friends all over the country. They host Happy Hour on Friday afternoons in one of the farm buildings and people stop in after work for a couple hours of social chatter and good food. Dad still rides his 3-wheeler and Mom cruises around on her golf cart. Hunting season just started and Dad is still the Hunt Master of the club his own father started so many years ago. Dad is still the best shot around too! And for Mom, if it's hunting season, then it's also shopping season and getting a running start on Christmas gifts and craft shows. She may have to use the wheel chair to walk as far as she used to, but she's getting it done!
I'm so proud of my parents. In all of life's up's and down's, they have never given up. They never gave up on each other or on anything they put their minds to do. God certainly knew what He was doing when he put those two together! My brother and I have been so blessed to learn from them how to love family and country, how to pick yourself up when things go sour, and to be resilient and bounce back without hardness of feelings. We learned how to show compassion, and to delight in nature's tiniest gifts, how to offer the best we have and to share of ourselves.
Thanks Mom and Dad! Congratulations on this your Special Day!
With much love,
Linda
