Archives for January 2009

Our first dinner party…

Forty-one years later, and I still remember our first…slightly disastrous…dinner party.

Thankfully, I was able to laugh then with everyone else and still think it’s funny. We had invited Bill’s parents, sister and grandmother to be our first dinner guests.

Bill and Penny cutting up as usual. Lots of laughter. Frank, Bobbie and Granny. 1967

As I vividly remember all these years later, Bill and I had spent the morning cleaning our little duplex apartment. It was late Autumn and between classes and working part-time for each of us, there wasn’t a lot of time to do housework. But now, everything was clean and polished and ready for company.

I certainly hadn’t perfected “cooking” yet, but had a few things I could do pretty well by then. I had prepared “Phony Spumoni”, an Italian gelatin salad in a triple tier mold that morning, as well as potato salad, and set them in the apartment’s ancient refrigerator.

Using a covered stoneware pot we’d received as a wedding gift, I’d made baked beans in the oven, and then prepared Southern fried chicken. I don’t remember for sure, but I believe we must have had hot biscuits and a dessert.

Our dinner guests arrived. We enjoyed visiting a little while and then it was time for dinner. First, it was time to unmold the “phony Spumoni”. I took it out of the fridge and turned it over onto a serving platter and a bed of greens. Splatter…splatter…splat…went the top two tiers of the spumoni. The old fridge had not done its job. We scooped up what we could that looked somewhat chilled, but the presentation had lost its effect.

I took the stoneware beanpot out of the oven and set it on top of the old gas stovetop. It burst. Yep. Beans went everywhere.

We all laughed and laughed, then ate what was left intact: fried chicken, potato salad, soupy spumoni and biscuits.

Christmas 1966…

Family, My Southern Heart, Reflections

It was our first Christmas together, and we were starting our own traditions. Christmas would always be special in our family…

Through the years, there have been many elaborate, beautiful Christmas trees…but none quite so special as this Charlie Brown Christmas tree. All that little tree had were colorful paper balls and tinsel.

I loved it just the same…

My twenty-first birthday…

My Southern Heart, Reflections

It was December 1, 1966…our birthday. We had been married since September. It was my twenty-first birthday and Bill’s twenty-third. Looking at the photo here, I’m wondering how many candles were on that cake…quite a few!

Funny how clothing and hair styles come full circle. I wish I had this ensemble I was wearing then now. Soft pink wool vest with covered buttons, an A-line skirt in the same soft pink wool and a white silk blouse. Remember, my Mama was a wonderful seamstress. The only problem is…even if I still had it, I couldn’t get in it! I weighed all of 107 pounds here.

And, yes, I know. The hairstyle is still similar…just lots of silver now highlighted in blonde.

Our first home…

My Southern Heart, Reflections

Our first home was a small, rented yellow brick duplex on a well-kept, tree-lined street. It was located about fifteen minutes from Memphis State where we were both students. It had newly refinished wood floors, a small living room, dining room, kitchen, 1 bedroom and 1 bathroom. There were plenty of windows which let in lots of light throughout.

What it didn’t have was a lot of furniture or the decorating expertise I’ve gathered all these years later. Don’t we always wish we’d known “then” what we know “now”.

Somehow, we’d inherited a used, ugly sofa sleeper that weighed a ton, and Bill made a large square table which held our tiny black & white television set. That was it for furniture in the living room. We laughed for years about that television, for it basically operated on a shoestring…literally. The TV would turn on and operated fine for a while…then the picture would start turning dark. Bill isolated the fuse or whatever in the back of the TV and attached a shoestring to it. When the picture started to turn dark, we’d pull the shoestring and wah-lah! The picture came back on! Years later, there would be televisions in several rooms of the house, but none that brought laughter like that one did. For $35, we’d purchased a used, hardrock maple round table and four captain chairs for the dining room…all in surprisingly excellent condition. Thankfully, I’d brought my new bedroom furniture from home.

We didn’t realize, or couldn’t have cared less, that our little home was sparsely furnished. We were newlyweds and so happy to be together. We were college students and each working part-time. We would study at our dining room table together or at the MSU library. We’d have friends over or friends would have us over. It was a wonderful time…

The beginning of a lifetime…

Reflections

It was Autumn of 1965 and I was falling in love…I just didn’t realize it at the time.

I thought Bill and I were just very close friends – soulmates – who spent as much time together as possible, sharing our deepest thoughts and feelings.

I was still hearing from Ross who was at sea on the U.S.S. Forrestal, and Bill was still dating the tall redhead named Linda. I knew he wasn’t serious about her, but she, evidently, had other plans. One afternoon in the BSU, I was sitting with a group of friends when Linda came over to our table. She had a notebook with her and commented directly to me, “I wanted to show you the menus I’ve planned for when Bill and I get married”…hmmm.

A loud bell went off in my head, and I remember the thought I had at that precise moment: “THAT’S what you think”. Quiet little Baptist girl I was…but the thought was there all the same.

Not long after that, Bill and I started officially dating exclusively. It was a late Autumn afternoon, and we went to the movies at the Audubon Park Theater. When we came out, night had fallen and it was snowing….enormous beautiful snowflakes drifting down in the moonlight. We drove through Audubon Park with its magnificent trees covered in a blanket of white. Bill spun circles in the snow in his black little VW bug, and we laughed until we almost cried…

Bill asked me to marry him sometime in early 1966…I said no the first time. I’m not sure why. Maybe I was still a little scared of the whole idea of marriage…I don’t know. I’m glad he asked the second time a few weeks later, when I promptly said yes.

We began planning a wedding for September 1966. We were both still in college and each working part-time. Needless to say, there was very little money; but we were young and in love, and that didn’t seem to be a problem. My mother made my beautiful wedding dress. I had an exquisite bouquet of yellow roses, and my bridesmaids each carried a long-stemmed yellow rose with greenery and ribbons. The church was packed with family and friends. It was a beautiful wedding…

We couldn’t afford an official “honeymoon” at that time, so we took special day trips to fun places within driving distance of our new little duplex home. We drove to Shiloh and toured the battlefields of the Civil War. We went to Pickwick Lake…and even managed to get an invitation to go below to see the inner workings of the huge dam there (Bill was an industrial technology major and loved that). We took a picnic to Shelby Forest. Without spending much money at all, it was still a wonderful time…

Leaving the church after the reception…back when everyone still threw RICE at you!