Forty-five Years

David and I keep telling each other we can’t be old enough to have been married forty-five years, but this Sunday we are celebrating that anniversary. Forty-seven years ago we started dating and we got serious pretty quickly. I knew this was the man for me. He was my soul mate. No other guy did anything for me. It was like all through high school I was waiting for the right guy to come along and my junior year David came to my high school.

David’s parents had moved to the Virgin Islands and he didn’t want to go there his senior year, so he moved in with his aunt and uncle for the year. That didn’t work out so he moved in with his grandparents later. I knew all his family as I had grown up in the same town. He sat behind me at our first football game, we went to a movie the next Sunday, he gave me a “steady” ring and the rest is history. I know some people think we were much too young to know what we wanted, but we knew.

Fast forward through all the years and here we are. A good time to remember our wedding day. Here are a few pictures from that day. My Uncle Russell took most of the pictures. We didn’t have professional photographers at weddings back then. Somehow it seems better that way to have a family member catch the moments.

I looked like an angel in this picture. Boy, did I have David fooled.

My sister, Joanne and David’s brother, Bill were our only attendants. The dresses were made by a seamstress in town. My colors were pink and white.

We were married by two pastors. I liked the pastor we had, but I also wanted to be married by the pastor under whom I became a church member and was saved. I loved Reverend Stockinger. He was truly a godly man. So maybe that is why our vows took so solidly. No, I just think we took our vows seriously.

My daddy said he just could not give one of his daughters away so my oldest brother, Jack, gave me away. Jack has since passed away. I miss him.

I loved my cake. It was iced in a basket weave and was so pretty. I don’t remember tasting it. I was in a daze that day.

My sister wore a pink dress, pink hose and pink shoes. She did that just for me.

Is that a look of adoration or what? My sister-in-law was about to give birth. My niece and David’s sister look so little. Oh my.

We left the church to get in the car to drive around town honking the horn. David’s brother drove and because he lived in the Virgin Islands, he forgot he was supposed to drive on the right side of the road and we rode out of town on the left side screaming at him to get over. We died laughing over that.

After the reception, we went to get our car. David had parked it at the Stuckey’s where I worked at the time thinking it would be safe from getting decorated. We were wrong.

My co-workers had made sure we would not escape and decorated the car to include bottle caps in the hubcaps that made a racket when we drove away. David finally had to stop and remove the hubcaps and take them out before we went on our honeymoon.